UC-NRLF 


B    14 


iiKlppW| 

:AvJN   E 


MONK    AND    KNIGHT 

VOLUME  I. 


MONK   AND   KNIGHT 


AN 


f tetortcat  ^tuti?  in  fiction 

BY 

FRANK   W.  GUNSAULUS 


IN  TWO   VOLUMES 
VOLUME  I. 


CHICAGO 

A.    C.    McCLURG   AND    COMPANY 
1891 


COPYRIGHT, 

BY  A.    C.    McCLURG   AND  CO. 

A.  D.  1891. 


PS 


NOTE. 

TT  is  proper  to  say  that  the  large  number  of  well- 
•*•  known  sayings,  letters,  and  documents  which  occur 
in  this  study  of  the  early  half  of  the  sixteenth  century, 
appear  in  those  translations  with  which,  as  the  Author 
is  led  to  believe,  the  general  reader  is  most  familiar. 
So  far  as  he  knows,  each  of  these  has  taken  its  place 
as  a  part  of  literature  or  history.  He  desires  to  acknowl- 
edge with  gratitude  many  kindnesses  characteristic  of  the 
late  Ferdinand  Denis,  Administrator  of  the  Bibliotheque 
Sainte  Genevieve,  to  whom  it  was  a  joy  even  to  apply 
for  copies  of  unique  historical  manuscripts. 


PLYMOUTH  CHURCH  STUDY, 
CHICAGO. 


CONTENTS. 


PROEM.  —  THE  MORNING  HOUR  IN  EUROPE   . 


PAGE 
9 


CHAPTER 

I.   ENTERTAINING  ANGELS  UNAWARES      .     .  28 

II.   STRANGERS  AND  FELLOW-CITIZENS      .     -  37 

III.  A  RECOGNIZED  GUEST 46 

IV.  AT  AN  ENGLISH  ABBEY 54 

V.   UNPLEASANT  VISITORS 65 

VI.  A  NOVICE  AND  FUGITIVE 80 

VII.  A  FRENCH  CHATEAU .     .  88 

VIII.  THE  KING  UNDER  GOVERNANCE  ....  97 

IX.   WITCHES  AND  KNIGHTS 108 

X.  A  YOUNG  SCHOLAR  AND  A  YOUNG  KING  121 

XI.  THE  HOLY  CATHOLIC  CHURCH    .     .     .     .  131 

XII.  THE  HOLY  CATHOLIC  CHURCH    ....  141 

XIII.  FADING  FACTS  AND  LIVING  DREAMS    .     .  148 

XIV.  A  VISITOR  AT  GLASTONBURY 161 

XV.  A  SHAKING  FAITH 177 

XVI.    AT    LUTTERWORTH    AGAIN l86 

XVII.   A  WALDENSIAN  OF  THE  RENAISSANCE     .  193 

XVIII.   MAIDEN  AND  NOVICE     .......  201 

XIX.   HOLY  COMMUNION 212 

XX.  MARIGNANO 224 

XXI.   POPE,  KING,  AND  KNIGHT 236 

XXII.  UNRENEWED  FRANCE 245 


8 


CONTENTS. 


CHAPTER 

XXIII. 

XXIV. 

XXV. 

XXVI. 

XXVII. 

XXVIII. 

XXIX. 

XXX. 

XXXI. 

XXXII. 

XXXIII. 

XXXIV. 


PAGE 

THE  WHITE  PEAK  AMID  DARK  CLOUDS  .  250 

EASTER  AT  GLASTONBURY  ......  261 

THE  GROWING  PROBLEM 269 

AN  IMPASSABLE  ABYSS 278 

AN  UNCHAINED  BOOK    .......  293 

AN  UNCHAINED  BOOK 304 


VIAN  THE  PYTHAGOREAN    .... 
A  CALL  UPON  THE  CARDINAL     .     . 
THE  FIELD  OF  THE  CLOTH  OF  GOLD 
JEALOUSY  AND  MAGNIFICENCE    .     . 
LOVE  AND  LEARNING 


3" 

327 
333 
342 
349 


AN  UNHORSED  KNIGHT 360 


MONK   AND   KNIGHT. 


PROEM. 

THE   MORNING   HOUR   IN   EUROPE. 

Other  futures  stir  the  world's  great  heart ; 

Europe  has  come  to  her  majority, 

And  enters  on  the  vast  inheritance 

Won  from  the  tombs  of  mighty  ancestors,  — 

The  seeds,  the  gold,  the  gems,  the  silent  harps 

That  lay  deep  buried  with  the  memories 

Of  old  renown. 

GEORGE  ELIOT. 

THE  Renaissance  was  a  reformation  of  the  European 
intellect ;  the  Reformation  was  a  renaissance  of  the 
European  conscience.  Both  movements  were  returns  to 
the  past :  the  intellect  found  deliverance  from  scholas- 
ticism in  its  study  of  Greece  and  Rome  ;  the  conscience 
felt  the  chains  of  ecclesiasticism  disappear  as  once  more 
it  saw  the  open  gospel  of  the  Christ.  Each  movement 
was  also  a  distinctly  marked  step  into  the  future,  because, 
in  each,  the  human  soul  had  rediscovered  itself,  and  read- 
ily bounded  forward  with  a  persuasion  that  to  it  alone 
belonged  the  infinite  time. 


IO  MONK  AND  KNIGHT. 

To  those,  however,  to  whom  institutions  and  traditions 
are  more  sacred  than  the  soul,  it  must  always  appear  that 
the  reins  of  the  future  were  held,  in  the  earlier  decades 
of  the  sixteenth  century,  by  four  boys,  each  of  whom 
looked  forth  with  vivid  expectations  into  manhood.  He 
who  was  to  rule  the  Church  as  Leo  X.  had  been  Cardi- 
nal since  he  was  thirteen;  Henry  VIII.  succeeded  to 
the  fortunes  of  the  Tudor  dynasty  in  1509,  at  the  age 
of  eighteen;  six  years  later,  Francis  I.,  the  incarnation 
of  strong  ambitions  and  weak  convictions,  was  sovereign  of 
France  at  the  age  of  twenty;  and,  in  1519,  at  the  same 
age,  Charles  V.  of  Spain  was  chosen  to  a  crown  unsur- 
passed in  importance,  by  the  extent  and  richness  of  its 
dominion,  since  the  days  of  Charlemagne. 

These  men  will  interest  us,  for  the  most  part,  only  as 
the  less  conspicuous  currents  of  human  life,  which  less 
illustrious  mortals  represent,  rushing  against  them,  are 
temporarily  deflected  in  their  movements,  or  made  to 
bear  the  shadow  of  immense  personal  influences  upon 
their  moving  surfaces.  Greater  than  all  of  them  was 
the  incoming  tide,  which  was  to  make  such  new  con- 
figurations in  the  old  shores,  and  strew  them  so  luxu- 
riantly with  seaweed,  wreck,  and  pearls. 

There  is  much  to  interest  the  thinker  when  the  frag- 
ments of  some  fine  old  mediaeval  ship  are  lifted  upon  the 
sands.  Many  hands  lent  their  skill  to  its  creation,  and 
many  human  hearts  fastened  their  hopes  and  aspira- 
tions to  its  strength.  Much  of  the  highest  faith  which 
man  knew  was  enshrined  in  its  hard  tissues,  and  much  of 
human  longing  went  out  with  the  moment  of  its  dedica- 
tion to  the  unknown  sea.  If  it  be  a  creed  which  once 
promised  a  vision  of  some  far-away  shore,  or  an  institution 
which  held  the  desire  of  man  from  the  deeps,  there  will 
be  voices  only  to  wail  and  eyes  only  to  weep,  as  the  wave 
rolls  back.  It  must  not  astonish,  if  often,  when  some 


THE  MORNING  HOUR  IN  EUROPE.  1 1 

wave  more  vast  than  the  rest,  and  flashing  with  a  fuller 
splendor,  shall  have  thrown  far  to  land  a  single  pearl, 
stolen  in  its  leaping  energy  from  some  unsuspected  depth, 
—  a  pearl  which  has  both  Orient  and  Occident  hidden  in 
its  radiant  completeness,  —  a  pearl  which  shall  remind  the 
soul  of  the  richness  of  the  concealed  realms  of  life,  — 
there  shall  be  no  eye  to  perceive  its  glory,  or  no  heart 
brave  enough  to  seize  it,  before  it  sljall  be  covered  with 
the  sea-weed  and  the  slime.  The  very  brilliance  of  the 
movement  known  as  the  Renaissance  is  often  to  be  seen 
hard  by  the  darkness  which  had  grown  old  and  shadowy ; 
and  popes  and  kings,  so  much  the  conservators  and 
guardians  of  institutions,  so  little  the  inspirers  and  leaders 
of  men,  must  be  expected  to  impersonate  the  obedient 
and  serviceable  midnight  rather  than  the  imperious,  rest- 
less morning. 

At  the  earliest  date  mentioned  in  connection  with 
these,  who  were  the  visible  rulers  of  sixteenth-century 
Christendom,  duly  honored  and  enthroned,  what  is  called 
the  Renaissance  had  advanced,  even  in  France,  England, 
and  Germany,  to  something  like  a  sure  promise  of  vic- 
tory ;  and  that  great  band,  separated  by  seas  and  moun- 
tains, but  undivided  and  indivisible  in  spirit  and  in  hope, 
called  the  "  Reformers  before  the  Reformation,"  had  cre- 
ated an  atmosphere  so  resonant  and  withal  so  true  that 
the  blows  of  Martin  Luther  had  promise  of  being  heard 
from  echoing  cathedral  doors. 

It  is  the  most  mischievous  of  errors  —  I  had  almost 
said  the  most  perilous  of  habits  —  for  historians  to  seek 
to  separate  the  intellectual  from  the  spiritual  elements 
which  coexist  within  that  vast  and  chaotic  solution  out 
of  which  ultimately  came  the  order  and  power  of  modern 
life.  Columbus  the  Spanish  discoverer,  is  Columbus  the 
religionist,  who  writes  in  his  log-book  the  words,  "  In  the 
name  of  Jesus."  Even  the  monk  is  the  copyist  of 
classics ;  and  the  thunder  of  Savonarola,  who  seemed  to 


12  MONK  AND  KNIGHT. 

disdain  the  Renaissance  in  his  effort  at  reformation, 
breaks  the  bonds  which  linger  to  fetter  the  brain  of 
Florence.  The  human  soul  is  a  unit.  Faith,  in  all 
comprehensive  accounts  of  it,  is  the  act  of  the  whole 
spirit,  —  intellect,  sensibilities,  will.  The  advance  of  the 
mental  faculties  meant  perhaps  less  belief,  but  certainly 
more  faith,  for  the  deepening  of  man's  religious  life. 
The  purification  and  development  of  true  faith  meant 
perhaps  a  less  number  of  theories,  but  certainly  a  larger 
knowledge  for  man's  intellectual  life. 

The  Renaissance,  as  it  flowered  into  the  Reformation, 
was  a  new  birth  of  the  whole  man.  It  was  an  evolution  ; 
it  was  a  revolution,  —  a  revolution  inside  an  evolution. 
It  was  an  orderly  movement ;  it  was  a  disorderly  move- 
ment, —  the  disorder  was  walled  in,  and  guarded  by 
order.  Cosmos  comprehended  chaos,  and  at  length 
ruled  it  with  a  supreme  gentleness.  Delayed  evolution 
always  makes  revolution  ;  and  less  of  storm  was  unavoid- 
able, for  so  long  the  calm  had  been  a  crime. 

"  Down  came  the  storm.     In  ruins  fell 

The  worn-out  world  we  knew. 
It  passed,  —  that  elemental  swell,  — 
Again  appeared  the  blue." 

When  Henry  VIII.  advanced  to  the  English  throne, 
and  the  young  Francis,  Due  d'Angouleme,  was  playing 
the  part  of  a  sportive  boy,  in  1509,  the  currents  of  the 
Renaissance  had  gathered  strength,  as  they  flowed,  and 
England  and  France  had  begun  to  feel  the  well-nigh 
omnipotent  impulse.  The  world  had  been  growing 
larger  as  the  human  soul  had  been  quickened  into  new 
life  and  hope.  For  two  hundred  years  the  world  had 
possessed  Gioja's  compass.  The  telescope  had  been 
bringing  the  glowing  secrets  of  immensity  into  the  human 
brain  for  more  than  two  and  one-half  centuries.  Paper 
and  gunpowder  had  anticipated  the  invention  of  the 


THE  MORNING  HOUR  IN  EUROPE.  13 

printing-press,  in  1438,  by  more  than  two  hundred  years. 
Columbus  had  vied  with  Copernicus  in  quoting  from 
Aristotle  and  Philolaus,  until  ecclesiasticism  had  grown 
indignant,  and  stupid  royalty  had  smiled.  The  sailors 
of  Portugal  had  been  as  bold  in  the  East  and  in  the  West 
as  had  the  thinkers  at  Florence  and  the  artists  of  Rome 
in  their  treatment  of  ideas.  Italy  had  felt  the  tread  of 
Greek  scholars  who  fled  from  Constantinople  to  her 
quiet  shores  as  certainly  as  had  that  city  of  the  East  felt 
the  inroads  of  the  victorious  Turks.  The  scholar  had 
walked  the  streets  of  Florence,  since  the  Council  of  1438 
between  the  Greek  and  Latin  Churches,  with  the  freedom 
with  which,  for  centuries  before  the  opening  of  the  Mid- 
dle Ages,  the  Roman  soldier  paced  the  streets  of  Jerusa- 
lem. In  1470  Virgil  was  printed,  to  be  followed,  in  less 
than  a  generation,  by  Homer  and  Aristotle.  In  1482 
Plato  spoke  to  Italy  in  the  Latin  tongue,  through  the 
translations  of  Ficino ;  and  for  years  a  lamp  had  burned 
before  his  bust  in  the  palace  of  the  Medici.  While  the 
flesh  of  Savonarola  was  burning,  his  beloved  city  had 
been  reading  the  explanation  of  the  harmony  between 
Moses,  the  lawgiver  of  Israel,  and  Plato,  the  philosopher 
of  Greece,  from  the  pen  of  Mirandola.  For  a  century  a 
shipload  of  gems  from  India,  relics  from  Judaea,  arms 
from  Persia,  or  many-colored  dyes  from  Tyre  or  Phoenicia 
had  been  held  to  be  incomparably  poor,  by  the  side  of 
a  galley  in  whose  freight  might  be  found  the  manuscript 
of  an  oration  of  Cicero  or  that  of  a  play  of  ^Eschylus. 
Barlaam,  fresh  from  ecclesiastical  councils,  had  opened 
the  poetry  of  Greece  to  the  student  of  the  classics. 
Petrarch  had  sung  the  delicate  joys  of  the  most  tender 
of  Italian  poets ;  and  the  school  of  Chrysolaus  had  for  a 
hundred  years  been  duly  celebrated.  Bessarion  had 
made  the  air  about  him  Athenian  in  its  quality ;  and  the 
monasteries  had  been  regarded  for  so  long  as  the  treasure- 
houses  of  manuscripts,  that  the  hidden  depravity  of  their 


14  MONK  AND    KNIGHT. 

clergy  had  been  almost  forgotten.  Even  in  Germany, 
Politian,  the  Italian  poet,  had  made  a  new  career  for  him- 
self, in  John  Reuchlin,  theologian  and  humanist.  Latin 
poets  at  Erfurt  had  seconded  the  impulse  generated  by  the 
Elector  Frederic,  who  had  founded  the  University  of 
Wittenberg.  The  universities  of  Paris  and  Cologne  had 
sought  to  surpass  Florence  and  Venice,  in  offering  hospi- 
tality to  penniless  Greek  scholars  and  wandering  pedants, 
who  often  spoke  and  wrote  abominable  Latin. 

The  complete  sway  of  the  Renaissance  had,  however, 
its  most  brilliant  testimony  in  Italy.  Angelo  had  walked 
through  the  gardens  of  Lorenzo,  which  were  full  of  classic 
art  in  the  forms  of  figures  and  statues,  studying  the  an- 
tique ;  and  in  the  evenings  he  had  talked  with  Landino 
or  Pulci  about  the  myths  of  classic  times.  He  had  read 
Dante  in  the  same  palace  in  which  he  learned  Platonism  ; 
and  he  was  now  dreaming  of  the  glory  of  the  Sistine  ceiling. 
It  was  an  atmosphere  in  which  a  Nicholas  V.  could  out- 
wardly and  proudly  aid  a  Theodore  Gaza  and  John 
Argyrolos  in  the  attempt  to  interest  Europe  in  the  Iliad 
and  Odyssey.  Boccaccio's  prose  translation  of  Homer 
was  in  the  hands  of  scholars  like  Erasmus,  while  cer- 
tain of  the  priests  of  the  Church  labored  to  convince 
him  that  the  souls  of  brutes  and  men  were  the  same, 
and  quoted  Pliny  as  authority.  While  Rienzi  had  been 
storming  the  castle  of  an  extortionate  nobility,  Dante  was 
uttering  his  devotion  to  Virgil,  in  the  greatest  of  Italian 
poems. 

The  age  of  libraries  and  collectors,  of  the  Vatican  and 
the  Medicean,  of  Bracciolini  and  Aurispa,  had  come. 
The  era  of  critics  and  grammarians  had  succeeded  the 
era  of  feudal  lords  and  gay  knights.  The  lost  decades 
of  Livy  were  mourned  over,  as  the  world  never  had 
mourned  over  the  death  of  Peter  the  Hermit. 

The  new  crusader,  if  he  looked  toward  the  East  at  all, 
had  sought  to  recover  the  poems  of  Sappho,  rather  than 


THE  MORNING  HOUR  IN  EUROPE.  15 

to  scale  the  walls  of  Jerusalem.  Art  had  yielded  to  the 
revival.  Praxiteles  from  afar  had  given  a  new  edge  to 
the  chisel  of  Italian  sculpture,  and  classic  stories  and  the 
classic  spirit  had  broken  the  fetters  in  which  the  Church 
had  bound  the  genius  of  the  immediate  predecessors  of 
Da  Vinci  and  Raphael.  It  was  an  hour  when,  through 
the  revival  of  learning,  Henry  VIII.  was  able  to  hear  in 
his  land,  in  strange  renewal,  Roger  Bacon's  prophecy 
of  the  philosophy  of  Lord  Verulam  ;  when  in  France  the 
young  duke  soon  to  be  Francis  I.  might  have  heard,  over 
the  noise  of  the  proposed  crusades,  the  voice  of  Abelard 
breaking  in  upon  his  wooing  of  Eloise,  with  protests 
against  the  confusion  of  word-mongering  with  philosophy ; 
when  in  Italy  even  the  ears  of  Leo  X.  were  attentive  to 
words,  now  aged  enough,  which  had  recorded  the  intel- 
lectual self-respect  of  the  Fratricelli.  That  mighty  tri- 
umvirate —  Dante,  Savonarola,  Angelo,  each  one  of 
whom  has  been  called  the  prophet  of  the  Renaissance : 
the  first,  a  reformer  and  artist  in  poetic  words;  the 
second,  a  poet  and  artist  in  reforming  deeds ;  the  third, 
a  reformer  and  poet  in  art  —  marks  an  era  in  Italy,  in 
which  the  mind  of  man  acknowledged  the  subtle  inter- 
penetration  of  Orient  and  Occident. 

The  West  had  been  touched  by  the  East  in  literature 
and  philosophy.  The  greater  West  had  been  discovered 
by  a  West  which  had  already  become  Eastern.  The 
geography  of  the  earth  was  changing  with  the  geography 
of  the  mind  of  man.  There  was  the  printing-press, 
which,  from  the  day  of  Gutenberg,  had  made  intelligence 
independent  of  all  localities.  Man  had  come  to  a  con- 
sciousness of  his  large  world  relations,  and  the  era  of 
questioning  all  traditions  and  boundaries  was  fairly 
inaugurated. 

It  was  impossible  to  keep  this  new  life  from  entering 
quite  as  deeply  into  the  brain  and  heart  of  England 
and  France.  For  almost  a  generation  the  silence  of  the 


1 6  MONK  AND  KNIGHT. 

solemn  cloisters  of  Westminster  had  been  disturbed  by 
the  creaking  of  Caxton's  press;  and  the  monks  of  St. 
Albans  had  mingled  their  muttered  prayers  with  the  more 
intelligible  sounds  of  the  busy  pressman,  comprehending 
little  how  mighty  a  power  that  printing-press  would  be- 
come in  the  demolition  of  Romish  rites.  While  Niccolo 
de  Niccoli  was  gathering  the  volumes  of  Boccaccio  into 
their  new  wooden  cases  in  the  convent  of  San  Spirito, 
another  scholar  was  beholding  that  elegant  copy  of  Livy 
in  French,  —  a  volume  of  which  the  good  Duke  Hum- 
phrey was  the  glad  recipient,  —  a  superb  example,  withal, 
from  that  collection  of  nearly  nine  hundred  gorgeously 
bound  volumes  which  the  enthusiastic  bibliophile  the 
Duke  of  Bedford  had  obtained  from  Charles  V.  of 
France.  No  longer  did  every  scholarly  chronicler  write, 
as  did  the  Venerable  Bede  in  commemoration  of  the 
chastity  of  Etheldreda,  — 

"  Let  Maro  wars  in  loftier  numbers  sing  ; 
I  sing  the  praises  of  our  heavenly  king. 
Chaste  is  my  verse,  nor  Helen's  rape  I  write  : 
Light  tales  like  these  but  prove  the  mind  as  light." 

On  the  other  hand,  for  two  centuries  many  of  the  priests 
had  been  ambitious  to  exhibit  a  classical  style  in  speech, 
and  some  of  the  affectations  which  the  Renaissance  begat 
in  the  abbeys  were  ludicrous  indeed.  While,  in  Italy, 
Angelo  was  proclaiming  the  Torso  Belvedere  as  his  true 
master,  John  Colet  was  bringing  into  his  own  England 
those  lectures  to  be  delivered  at  the  University  of  Oxford, 
in  which  "  the  new  learning  "  was  to  find  its  first  public 
alliance  with  the  Bible.  When  Alberto  Pio  was  supplying 
Aldus  with  the  funds  with  which  he  obtained  the  machin- 
ery known  as  the  Aldine  press,  Linacre  and  Grocyn  were 
under  the  tuition  of  Politian  and  Chalcondyles ;  and  in 
1491  Oxford  had  known  how  earnestly  they  had  studied 
in  the  Platonic  academy.  As  Columbus  heard  from  the 
"  Pinta  "  the  cry,  "  Land  ahead  !  "  Thomas  More  was  com- 


THE  MORNING   HOUR  IN  EUROPE.  17 

ing  under  their  influence  as  teachers  of  "  the  new  learning." 
"  Greece  had  crossed  the  Alps,"  when  Reuchlin  had  in  his 
hand  the  translation  of  Thucydides  ;  Greece  had  crossed 
the  channel  when  Erasmus  had  perceived  the  possibilities 
of  the  career  of  Henry  VIIL,  when  the  scholar  saw  him, 
at  nine  years  of  age,  at  the  court  of  Henry  VII. 

A  long  ancestry  preceded  Archbishop  Warham  and 
William  Latimer,  one  of  whom  was  furnishing  Erasmus 
with  beer  at  Oxford,  the  other  of  whom  was  so  soon  to 
popularize  his  influence  at  Cambridge.  Alcuin,  at  York, 
learning  what  to  obtain  abroad  to  enrich  the  libraries  of 
kings,  and  walking  in  the  shade  of  Egbert,  who  had  ran- 
sacked Rome  for  treasures ;  John  of  Bruges,  who  was  a 
bibliomaniac  with  the  most  omnivorous  appetite  ;  Thomas 
Cobham,  who  had  dreamed  of  a  great  library  at  Oxford 
in  1317  ;  Bishop  Carpenter  of  Exeter,  who  added  books 
to  the  relics  which  slumbered  in  the  charnel-house; 
William  Taunton,  who  succeeded  that  Amator  Librorum  ; 
John  Taunton,  at  Glastonbury ;  Peter  of  Blois,  and  the 
thousand  unknown  book-lovers  who  helped  to  copy  and 
collate,  to  steal  and  buy  the  fragments  of  the  litera- 
ture of  the  past,  —  all  of  them  spoke  in  the  dawn  of  a 
new  day,  with  a  clear  voice  and  rejoicing  tones.  Every- 
thing seemed  to  conspire,  for  a  combination  of  the  ener- 
gies which  had  awakened  Italy,  around  the  throne  which 
was  soon  to  be  occupied  by  a  new  king.  That  combina- 
tion had  been  making,  from  the  moment  of  Roger  Bacon's 
utterance  until  the  hour  when,  in  1498,  the  eager  Lord 
Mountjoy  had  brought  Erasmus  to  England. 

Smaller  by  far  was  the  influence  of  the  Renaissance 
in  the  land  soon  to  be  ruled  by  Francis  I ;  yet  by 
1515  the  sky  of  France  was  full  of  morning  light.  The 
scholastic  philosophy  which  had  made  theology  so  aim- 
less and  so  heavy,  had  felt  a  penetrating  gleam  strike  its 
dolorous  fog.  The  University  of  Paris  was  aware  that  a 
fresh  radiance  was  stealing  over  the  sky.  Some  of  the 
VOL.  i.  —  2. 


1 8  MONK  AND  KNIGHT. 

Greek  mercenaries  employed  by  Louis  XII. — with  one 
of  whom  we  shall  become  acquainted  in  this  study  — 
had  come  with  the  power  of  the  future  wrapped  up  with 
their  memories  of  the  past ;  and  often  in  the  clothes  of 
some  exiled  child  of  Athens  could  be  found  a  copy  of  a 
page  from  some  one  of  the  classics.  Gregory  of  Tiferno 
was  trying  to  teach  Greek  and  rhetoric  in  Paris  when 
Felelfo  was  commenting  on  Dante  at  Milan.  Basselin, 
Villon,  and  Alan  Chartier  were  poets  whose  lays  were  com- 
pelled to  mingle  with  humorous  quotations  from  Homer 
and  Plautus,  brought  thither  by  exiles  and  wanderers ; 
and  the  scholars  in  the  Church  speedily  saw,  in  spite  of 
the  darkness  of  the  Sorbonne,  that  some  reconciliation 
must  ultimately  be  made  between  letters  and  belief. 
Learning  was  knocking  at  the  door  of  the  Holy  Church ; 
and  the  associates  of  the  new  king  were  soon  bound  at 
least  to  affect  Greek  art,  Roman  literature,  and  the  soci- 
ety of  printers  such  as  the  Estiennes,  and  scholars  such 
as  Louis  de  Berquin  and  Lefevre.  The  air  was  balmy 
with  the  fragrant  dawn,  though  the  Church  and  the 
throne  were  asleep. 

This  mighty  revolution  in  the  thought  of  humanity, 
quickening  the  mind  to  larger  and  stronger  action,  broad- 
ening before  it  the  countless  opportunities  for  the  exer- 
cise of  its  energies,  holding  in  front  of  it  a  multitude  of 
fascinating  invitations  to  unsuspected  achievements,  urg- 
ing it  to  accept  them  by  numberless  thrilling  impulses, 
—  this  veritable  dawn  broke  upon  the  brain  of  Europe 
at  the  hour  when  the  human  soul  had  become  conscious 
of  its  slavery  to  the  institution  called  the  Holy  Catholic 
Church.  Already  conscience  was  revolting  against  her 
practices,  and  was  in  rebellion  against  her  superstitions. 
Noble  as  had  been  the  ministry  of  the  Church  for  centu- 
ries ;  great  as  had  been  her  service  as  a  bridge  from  the 
old  Roman  world  to  the  new  world  just  before  man's 


THE  MORNING  HOUR  IN  EUROPE.  19 

vision  ;  indispensable  as  she  had  been  as  a  power  for  order 
and  progress  in  government,  education,  and  religion,  for 
ten  centuries  and  more,  —  the  hour  had  at  length  come 
when  that  function  was  no  longer  needed,  and  it  was  evi- 
dent that  she  had  refused  to  take  up  the  next  great  duty. 
She  was  declining  to  lead  the  intellect  into  the  new  realms 
which  it  was  predestined  to  enter  and  to  conquer.  She 
was  looking  backward,  not  forward.  ^She  was  asserting 
her  authority  without  having  any  echo  start  in  the  reason 
and  thought  of  man.  She  relied  on  her  might  as  an  in- 
stitution, at  the  hour  when  man  had  concluded  that  insti- 
tutions are  not  ends,  but  means  to  ends.  Democracy 
was  in  the  air;  she  was  imperial,  monarchic,  absolute. 
Human  life  had  grown  too  large  and  too  powerful  to  be 
limited  or  dominated  by  the  conception  which  she  had 
of  its  possibilities. 

In  1484  John  Laillier,  Doctor  of  the  Sorbonne,  cried 
out :  "  Since  the  days  of  Saint  Sylvester,  Rome  is  no 
church  of  Christ,  but  a  mere  state  church  for  extorting 
money."  Ten  years  later,  Columbus  had  read  a  new  dec- 
laration of  independence  to  the  enterprise  of  man,  and 
inflamed  the  imagination  of  Europe,  by  finding  a  fresh 
field  for  human  endeavor  and  achievement.  Three  years 
later  still,  Aldus  Manutius  the  printer  had  written  in  his 
edition  of  Aristotle  :  "  Those  who  cultivate  letters  must 
be  supplied  with  books  necessary  for  their  purpose  ;  and 
till  this  supply  be  obtained  I  shall  not  be  at  rest."  "  In 
the  name  of  Jesus  Christ,"  was  the  legend  borne  by  the 
flag  of  each  new  crusader.  One  was  seeking  the  resur- 
rection place  of  the  essential  Christ  in  reform ;  another, 
in  discovery ;  another,  in  popular  intelligence.  A  fresh 
and  omnipotent  vision  of  the  real  Christ  had  come ;  the 
old  was  fading  away. 

Not  more  cruelly  did  the  Church  confine  the  brain 
and  assault  the  growing  intellect,  than  she  stupefied  and 


20  MONK  AND  KNIGHT. 

outraged  the  conscience  of  men.  She  was  an  institution 
which  by  remaining  stationary  had  become  rotten,  while 
her  walls  were  being  hung  with  colors  and  her  floors 
relaid  with  a  mosaic  of  gems.  The  soul  had  at  last  be- 
come too  large  for  the  garment,  however  elegant,  however 
sacred.  It  was  moth-eaten  and  decayed ;  the  soul  was 
never  so  conscious  of  rapidly  growing  youth.  Anything, 
however  coarse  the  texture  and  however  poor  in  historic 
associations,  if  only  it  were  both  large  and  clean,  would 
be  a  grateful  substitute  for  this  confining  and  unclean 
vesture.  As  the  brain  demanded  room  for  its  life  and 
development,  the  conscience  demanded  freedom  and 
righteousness. 

So  simply,  so  vitally  is  the  Reformation  connected  with 
the  Renaissance.  While  the  Greek  poets  were  being 
quoted  in  the  Florentine  academy,  Pope  Julius  II.  was 
acknowledging  the  immorality  of  the  leaders  of  the 
Church,  as  he  said,  "  If  we  ourselves  are  not  pious,  why 
should  we  keep  the  people  from  being  so?"  It  was  a 
long  train  of  abuses,  fostered  by  the  Holy  See  and 
blessed  by  priestcraft,  which  lay  behind  the  remark  of 
the  Pope  whose  voice  we  are  to  hear  in  the  progress  of 
events  which  this  study  partially  describes,  Leo  X.,  when 
he  said,  "  Let  us  enjoy  the  papacy,  now  that  God  has 
given  it  to  us."  Honest  and  pure  men  remembered,  at 
that  time,  that  only  a  generation  had  gone  since  the  papal 
throne  had  been  disgraced  by  the  presence  of  four  such 
men  as  Pietro  Barba,  Francesco  delle  Rovere,  Giambat- 
tista  Cibo,  and  Roderigo  Borgia.  The  lower  clergy,  also, 
had  for  many  years  presented  a  sorry  spectacle.  There 
had  been  noble  men  in  the  papal  chair ;  so  also  were 
there  many  men  pure  and  true  in  the  monasteries.  But 
the  majority  were  too  constant  in  practices  of  evil  to  make 
of  the  piety  and  purity  of  the  slight  minority  aught  but 
such  exceptions  as  proved  the  rule. 

The  intelligence  and  conscience  of  Europe  began  to 


THE  MORNING  HOUR  IN  EUROPE.  21 

behold  the  offence  against  civil  government,  in  a  condi- 
tion of  affairs  which  allowed  criminals  to  resort  to  the 
monastic  life  that  they  might  escape  the  just  punishment 
which  otherwise  would  descend  upon  their  wickedness. 
The  law  was  powerless;  the  Church  held  the  reins  of 
authority  over  the  State  as  surely  as  when  Gregory  VII. 
compelled  Henry  IV.  to  tread  with  bare  feet  the  ice-clad 
summit  of  Canossa,  and  bend  the  fortunes  of  empire  to 
his  tyrannical  arrogance. 

As  the  conscience  of  the  times  awakened  out  of  sleep, 
it  became  roused  to  indignant  protest.  The  man  who 
felt  a  new  dawn  over  the  intellect,  as  he  read  Petrarch's 
praise  of  classic  bards,  turned  another  page  and  read  his 
sonnet  on  the  papal  court  at  Avignon  ^  — 

"  Fountain  of  woe  !  Harbor  of  endless  ire  ! 

Thou  school  of  errors,  haunt  of  heresies  ! 
Once  Rome,  now  Babylon,  the  world's  disease, 
That  maddenest  men  with  fears  and  fell  desire  ! 
O  forge  of  fraud !    O  prison  dark  and  dire. 

Where  dies  the  good,  where  evil  breeds  increase  1 
Thou  living  Hell !     Wonders  will  never  cease, 
If  Christ  rise  not  to  purge  thy  sins  with  fire, 
Founded  in  chaste  and  humble  poverty, 

Against  thy  founders  thou  dost  raise  thy  horn, 

Thou  shameless  harlot !     And  whence  flows  this  pride  ? 
Even  from  foul  and  loathed  adultery, 

The  wage  of  lewdness.     Constantine,  return  ! 
Not  so,  the  felon  world  its  fate  must  bide.1 

He  saw  how  inevitably  Romish  ambition  and  greed 
had  brought  the  Holy  Church  to  such  a  condition. 
Men  had  already  demanded  reform.  Nearly  a  century 
before,  the  papal  legate  at  Basle,  Cardinal  Julian  Cesa- 
rini,  had  advocated  a  reform,  to  prevent  a  rebellion  of 
the  laity  and  the  extinction  of  the  clerical  functions.  As 
such  utterances  were  called  to  mind,  the  names  of  the 
earlier  reformers  shone  with  startling  brilliance.  Splen- 
did, indeed,  now  began  to  seem  the  figure  of  Peter  Waldo 

1  Symonds'  translation. 


22  MONK  AND  KNIGHT, 

at  Lyons  and  those  of  his  successors,  who  in  the  valleys 
of  Piedmont  and  Dauphiny  had  suffered  for  their  hope, 
as  they  had  stood  up  against  the  corruption  and  tyr- 
anny of  Rome.  Bright  became  the  face  of  Peter  de  Bruys, 
as  from  the  flames  of  1 130  his  eyes  quivered  with  the  sub- 
lime expectancy  that  the  abuses  in  the  Church  would  be 
mitigated.  Heroic  in  stature  began  to  tower  upward  the 
form  of  John  Wycliffe,  as  the  mind  of  Europe  woke  to  be- 
hold the  Church  of  his  time  usurping  the  rights  of  the 
Crown,  impoverishing  England  to  furnish  luxuries  for 
Rome,  while  two  popes  were  pronouncing  anathemas  each 
upon  the  other,  and  bishops,  like  Spener,  were  engaged  in 
wholesale  homicide  for  their  sakes.  As  the  disgraceful 
character  of  many  of  the  popes,  bishops,  abbots,  and 
priests  became  known,  the  thoughtful  layman  looked 
more  favorably  on  John  Huss  and  Jerome  of  Prague,  who 
had  denied  their  authority,  rejecting  the  value  set  upon 
their  excommunications,  and  treating  the  offered  indul- 
gences as  abominations ;  and  they  looked  less  favorably 
upon  those  who  lit  fires  for  their  martyrdom.  John 
Tauler  and  Gerard  Groote  —  one  giving  to  the  soul  the 
privilege  and  results  of  pious  meditations,  the  other 
constituting  the  Order  of  the  Brothers  of  a  Common 
Life  —  took  other  places  than  those  assigned  to  them 
by  crafty  priests,  when  the  people  felt  what  the  truth 
which  the  one  spoke  and  the  education  which  the  other 
began,  must  do  for  a  benighted  and  corrupt  Church. 
Thomas  a  Kempis  was  read  by  hundreds  who  had  done 
with  hollow  forms  and  debauched  bishops,  and  who 
sought,  instead,  the  power  of  God.  John  of  Wesel 
became  a  pillar  of  fire  by  night,  as  the  laity  began  to 
look  backward,  and  to  behold  how  dark  it  was  when  he 
truly  called  the  indulgences  "  errors  and  lies."  Darker 
still,  however,  had  it  continued  to  be.  Faithful  men  now 
listened  to  the  Bishop  of  Worms,  as  he  said  :  "  Concubi- 
nage, from  the  commencement  of  the  fifteenth  century, 


THE  MORNING  HOUR  IN  EUROPE.  23 

is  publicly  and  formally  practised  by  the  clergy,  and  their 
mistresses  are  as  expensively  dressed  and  as  respectfully 
treated  as  if  their  connection  were  not  sinful  and  inde- 
cent, but  honorable  and  praiseworthy."  Voices  which 
had  been  hushed  in  death  by  wicked  popes  and  ambi- 
tious councils,  rang  out  in  their  unforgotten  words  with 
an  eloquence  which  had  at  last  touched  every  sincere 
heart. 

Literature  had  a  rich  field  in  the  facts  and  fancies 
associating  themselves  with  an  unreformed  Church. 
Walter  Mapes  made  such  rare  sport  out  of  the  papal 
throne  and  the  monk's  cowl,  and  he  did  it  in  such 
excellent  rhyme,  that  it  is  impossible  to  read  either  the 
history  of  the  Church  or  the  history  of  wit,  and  omit 
his  "  Golias."  "  The  Vision  of  Piers  Plowman,"  and  the 
verses  of  Geoffrey  Chaucer  are  poems  quite  as  full  of 
genuine  agitation  on  the  topic  of  the  corruption  and 
crimes  of  the  Church,  as  was  a  speech  of  Daniel  O'Con- 
nell  concerning  the  state  of  Ireland.  With  unsparing 
sarcasm,  heartiest  good-humor,  and  often  with  noblest 
indignation  did  the  poets  and  teachers  of  the  fourteenth 
and  fifteenth  centuries  paint  an  institution,  haughty, 
selfish,  gross,  and  wicked,  filled  with  a  clergy  ignorant, 
vile,  tyrannical,  and  cruel.  Leo  X.  might  hasten  to 
forbid  the  "  Epistolae  Obscurorum  Virorum  "  to  be  read ; 
but  before  his  hour  had  come,  Petrarch,  Boccaccio, 
Dante,  and  Poggio  had  furnished,  through  the  help  of 
the  printing-press  newly  invented,  hundreds  of  volumes 
in  which  the  Church,  as  she  then  existed,  was  proven  to 
be  incapable  and  unworthy;  and  many  of  these  were 
prophets  of  that  day,  soon  to  come,  which  William  Tyn- 
dale  was  to  see.  "  If  God  will  spare  my  life,"  said  he  to 
a  learned  ecclesiastic,  "  I  will  cause  a  boy  that  driveth 
the  plough  shall  know  more  of  Scripture  than  thou  dost." 

These  books  of  unsparing  wit  and  liveliest  humor  had 


24  MONK  AND  KNIGHT. 

not  been  read  at  all,  had  there  not  been  a  keen  sense  of 
the  audacious  offensiveness  of  ecclesiastical  power.  It 
was  impossible  for  the  hierarchy  to  keep  such  of  her  own 
ranks  as  the  bishops  of  Augsburg,  Breslau,  and  Meissen 
from  telling  the  truth  concerning  the  real  condition  of 
religious  life  to  the  growing  host  who  had  no  longer 
faith  in  the  ideals  of  the  Church.  The  air  was  so 
charged  with  the  forces  of  reformation  that  the  songs 
of  the  shoemaker,  Hans  Sachs,  echoed  upon  the  morn- 
ing with  the  commanding  music  of  a  trumpet  calling 
unto  battle.  Germany  was  as  weary  of  extracting  coins 
from  the  labor  of  her  people,  to  make  rich  and  luxurious 
the  career  of  church  officials  at  Rome,  as  England  was  of 
beholding  what  a  door  was  opened  to  papal  arrogance, 
when  the  stupid  Henry  III.  admitted  the  claims  of  Rome. 
France,  however,  was  not  so  disgusted  at  the  licentious 
pomp  of  the  papal  court  at  Avignon,  between  1342  and 
1352,  as  was  even  the  easy  Italian  conscience,  in  the 
presence  of  such  a  state  of  affairs  in  the  Church  as 
would  justify  Dante,  when  he  said, — 

"  Modern  shepherds  need 

Those  who  on  either  hand  prop  and  lead  them, 
So  burly  are  they  grown  ;  and  from  behind 
Others  to  hoist  them.     Down  palfrey's  sides 
Spread  their  broad  mantles,  so  as  both  the  beasts 
Are  covered  with  one  skin.     O  patience  !  thou 
That  look'st  on  this,  and  dost  endure  so  long  ..." 

Italy  could  not  forget  the  associated  absolutism  of 
clergy  and  Guelphs  in  stimulating  civil  war.  A  Pope 
Urban  IV.  stealing  a  crown  to  place  it  on  the  head  of  a 
Charles  of  Anjou  was  not  a  figure  calculated  to  inspire 
religious  emotion.  Boniface  VI II.,  who  outrivalled  Hil- 
debrand  in  his  tyrannical  assumption  of  control  over  civil 
government,  stood  by  the  side- of  the  infamous  Inno- 
cent IV.,  who,  when  he  heard  of  the  death  of  Frederick 
of  Sicily,  wrote  to  his  sinful  clergy :  "  Let  the  heavens 


THE  MORNING  HOUR  IN  EUROPE.  2$ 

rejoice,  and  the  earth  be  glad ;  for  the  storm  that  was 
hovering  over  your  heads  has  been  averted  by  the  death 
of  this  man,  and  is  changed  into  refreshing  breezes  and 
nourishing  dews."  Gregory  X.  had,  two  hundred  years 
before,  tried  to  repress  what  he  called  "  those  extravagant 
swarms  of  holy  beggars,"  only  to  leave  certain  others  of 
the  religious  orders  masters  of  the  field.  But  so  deep 
was  the  necessity  for  reform,  and  so  impossible  was  it  for 
them  to  reform  the  orders  and  the 'institution,  that  the 
mendicants  either  uttered  protests  against  the  sins  and 
selfishness  of  the  popes,  or  corruptly  bargained  at  con- 
fessions and  led  in  the  carnival  of  licentiousness.  When 
men  were  most  bewildered,  and  were  most  strongly  com- 
manded, on  pain  of  eternal  hell,  to  obey  the  infallible 
head  of  the  Church,  the  mind  of  Europe  was  compelled 
to  behold  a  two-headed  papacy,  in  the  persons  of  an 
Urban  and  a  Clement,  each  during  life  asserting  in  the 
loftiest  fashion  that  the  other  was  fraudulent,  and  after 
death,  for  forty  years,  perpetuating  through  their  adhe- 
rents this  ludicrous  monstrosity,  until  with  Alexander  V. 
three  Popes  vied  with  one  another  in  confounding  and 
debauching  Christendom. 

A  sort  of  relief  came  when  this  abominable  controversy 
was  succeeded  by  the  elevation  and  deposition  of  one, 
who  was  only  approached  in  wickedness  by  Gregory  XII. 
and  Benedict  XIII., — John  XXIII.  by  name,  who  was 
greedy,  untruthful,  lascivious,  and  murderous  to  a  degree 
which  would  enable  him  to  conduct  a  wholesale  mas- 
sacre. Even  cardinals  were  compelled  to  be  awkwardly 
fastidious  about  what  they  would  drink  at  the  tables  of 
the  pious  dignitaries  and  exalted  ecclesiastics,  lest  the 
draught  should  prove  to  be  poison  instead  of  wine.  Pope 
and  anti-Pope,  as  Felix  V.  and  Nicholas  V.,  arranged 
their  troubles,  each  entirely  careless  of  the  rights  of  the 
laity.  A  Clement  V.  or  John  XXII.  could  add  to  sensual 
rapacity  a  record  of  so  following  the  meek  and  lowly 


26  MONK  AND  KNIGHT. 

Lord  as  to  leave  eighteen  thousand  gold  florins,  and 
nearly  seven  thousand  more  in  jewels  and  silver ;  and 
salvation  from  sin,  or  rather  deliverance  from  hell,  was 
to  be  obtained  only  through  certain  formularies  of  which 
they  were  the  masters,  or  certain  inventions  of  which 
they  were  sole  proprietors. 

Two  shameless  women,  Theodora  and  Marozia,  had 
so  often  and  so  easily  set  up  and  pulled  down  their 
relatives,  or  licentious  allies  in  sin,  that  there  grew 
up  what  perhaps  is  only  a  tradition,  —  that  the  illus- 
trious sinner  Joan  once  guarded  and  debauched  the 
Holy  See.  The  papal  right  and  dignity  had  been 
bought  and  sold  by  adulterers  and  murderers ;  it  had 
been  possessed  by  Benedict  IX.,  who  was  old  in  iniq- 
uity, and  yet  Pope  at  twelve  years  of  age ;  it  had  been 
rescued  by  Gregory  VII.,  who  made  it  usurp  the  rights 
of  empire. 

At  the  remembrance  of  these  things,  the  thought  of 
printing  a  Bible  for  all  men  to  read,  in  which  it  was 
taught  by  Peter  himself  that  all  Christians  are  priests  of 
the  living  God,  seemed  to  the  papacy  and  to  the  clergy 
like  inviting  a  revolution.  Of  course,  the  Bible  must  be 
read  and  explained  only  by  a  clerical  force,  sworn  to  an- 
nihilate such  results  as  this  ideal  would  produce  in  the 
minds  of  men,  moved  as  they  now  were,  and  liberated  as 
they  were  sure  to  be,  by  the  Renaissance.  That  men 
dared  to  dream  of  salvation,  except  through  the  long 
and  mechanical  devices  of  the  priesthood,  organized  and 
ruled  by  popes,  was  enough  to  close  every  Bible,  and 
start  the  fires  of  inquisitions. 

It  had  to  be  considered  heresy  worthy  of  death  to 
deny  the  absolute  necessity  of  penance  ;  else  how  could 
the  Church  have  enforced  her  flagellations,  confessions, 
hair-shirts,  grievous  pilgrimages,  painful  scourges,  exhaus- 
tive fasts,  which,  by  the  plan  of  granting  pardons  and 
selling  indulgences  to  those  who  could  buy  or  be  threat- 


THE   MORNING  HOUR  IN-  EUROPE.  2/ 

ened,  brought  gigantic  revenues  and  sweet  satisfaction  to 
the  coffers  and  ambition  of  the  Pope. 

One  of  the  Clements  had  invented  the  most  profit- 
able method  of  emptying  the  pockets  of  sinners,  and  fill- 
ing the  treasuries  of  luxurious  tyrants,  which  the  world 
ever  knew,  —  the  granting  of  indulgences.  This  was  the 
manner  of  his  thinking :  "  Christ  had  not  only  died  for 
men,  but  he  had  done  more ;  by  his  abundant  sufferings 
he  and  his  saints  had  filled  a  repository,  of  which  the 
Church  had  complete  control  on  earth,  —  a  treasury  of 
accessible  merit.  This  merit  could  be  doled  out  for  a 
consideration."  This,  which  was  insisted  upon  as  a  fact, 
lay  at  the  bottom  of  the  sale  of  indulgences.  Purgatorial 
fires  stood  ahead  for  those  who  had  paid  insufficiently, 
who  yet  had  paid  all  they  could  afford  to  pay  here.  At 
last,  while  the  pedler  of  indulgences  was  plying  his  trade 
in  the  country,  a  quarter  of  a  million  of  human  beings 
in  thirty  days  carried  to  Rome  their  coins  and  their  sins, 
dragging  their  souls  beneath  this  hideous  slavery. 

But  the  end  was  near;  for  the  Renaissance  had 
quickened  the  human  brain,  and  the  heart  was  in  revolt 
against  this  shameless  cruelty,  which  had  nothing  but 
swords  and  flame  for  those  who  dared  to  protest.  The 
conscience  thundered  and  lightened  above  the  abomi- 
nable spectacle.  The  storm  which  should  rend  many  a 
human  breast  and  overset  many  a  tradition,  belief,  and 
throne,  had  broken  upon  Europe,  never  to  be  silent  until 
a  better  day  had  come. 


CHAPTER   I. 

ENTERTAINING  ANGELS   UNAWARES. 

Avenge,  0  Lord,  Thy  slaughtered  saints,  whose  bones 
Lie  scattered  on  the  Alpine  mountains  cold  ; 
Even  them  who  kept  Thy  truth  so  pure  of  old, 
When  all  our  fathers  worshipped  stocks  and  stones, 
Forget  not ;  in  Thy  book  record  their  groans 
Who  were  Thy  sheep,  and  in  their  ancient  fold 
Slain  by  the  bloody  Piedmontese  that  rolled 
Mothers  with  infants  down  the  rocks.     Their  moans 
The  vales  redoubled  to  the  hills,  and  they 
To  heaven.     Their  martyred  blood  and  ashes  sow 
O'er  all  the  Italian  fields,  where  still  doth  sway 
The  triple  Tyrant ;  that  from  these  may  grow 
A  hundred-fold  who  having  learned  Thy  way, 
Early  may  fly  the  Babylonian  woe. 

MILTON. 

ALONG  red  wave  of  splendor  ran  swiftly  across  the 
summit  of  the  stainless  peak  which  towered  just 
behind  the  simple  dwelling  of  Caspar  Perrin.  The 
whole  year  had  been  one  of  such  agony  that  every 
night  the  quivering  crimson  on  the  mountain-top  seemed 
to  have  been  drained  from  human  hearts.  Caspar  sat 
with  the  sweetest  of  little  children  in  his  lap,  her  golden 
hair  playing  against  his  honest  breast,  as  the  Alpine 
breezes,  which  could  not  be  entirely  shut  out,  toyed 
tenderly  with  its  beauty.  It  was  midwinter,  1509,  of 
the  years  of  grace ;  but  it  would  have  been  impossible 
to  one  possessed  with  a  faith  less  strong  and  sublime 


ENTERTAINING  ANGELS   UNAWARES.         2$ 

than  that  of  this  stalwart  Waldensian  to  have  thought 
of  that  anguish-laden  year  as  "a  year  of  grace."  Ter- 
rible as  had  been  the  efforts  of  the  dominant  ecclesi- 
astical power,  under  the  guidance  of  Innocent  VIII., 
to  root  out  and  abolish  the  VValdensians  in  Italy,  France, 
and  Germany  more  than  twenty  years  before,  and  far 
more  general,  this  year  had  marked  the  very  height  of 
papal  intolerance  and  churchly  cruelty  as  they  raged  in 
that  lovely  valley. 

Many  years  before,  the  ancestors  of  Caspar  had  led 
their  little  ones  with  flock  and  herd  to  this  spot,  that 
the  walls  which  God  Himself  had  upraised  might  protect 
them.  The  family  had  that  intelligence  and  experience 
which  made  them  tremble  at  the  name  of  the  Holy 
Church.  Long  ago  they  had  learned  that  when  his 
Holiness  had  conferred  upon  their  Swiss  neighbors  the 
title  of  "  Protectors  of  the  Liberties  of  the  Church,"  the 
Pope  held  those  words  to  signify  something  very  differ- 
ent from  that  which  the  study  of  the  Scriptures  and 
purity  of  life  had  made  them  mean  amid  the  leaping 
waters,  the  clear  sunshine,  and  the  immutable  crags  of 
Switzerland. 

This  year  had  enabled  them  to  read  for  themselves 
infallible  signs  of  the  spirit  which  demanded  a  reforma- 
tion on  every  hand.  No  longer  could  the  simplest 
villager  or  the  most  solitary  mountaineer  content  his 
enthusiasm  of  opposition  to  Rome  by  informing  it  with 
the  memory  of  what  some  chance  traveller  from  France 
or  Germany  had  related  to  him,  in  whispers,  of  the 
wrongs  which  under  papal  protection  held  carnival. 
The  fire  was  glowing  and  blowing  into  a  fury,  from 
fuel  cut  at  his  own  door.  The  year  1509  had  been 
so  decisive  that  it  had  lifted  many  a  less  sensitive  and 
positive  man  than  was  Caspar  Perrin  over  into  the  pro- 
digious movement  called  the  Reformation. 

He  had  just  fed  the   little  girl  her  evening  meal  of 


30  MONK  AND  KNIGHT. 

goat's  milk  and  bread,  and  was  looking  into  one  of  those 
unsubstantial  and  yet  real  worlds  which  lie  behind  and 
often  within  the  world  of  sense.  It  was  along  that  line 
where  memory  and  imagination  confront  each  other  — 
the  one  looking  backward  and  the  other  looking  forward 
—  that  Caspar's  mind  was  travelling.  He  was  behold- 
ing how  indivisible  these  realms  —  the  very  dwelling- 
places  and  haunts  of  these  two  faculties  —  seem  to  be, 
as  his  recollections  went  back  but  a  few  months  to  the 
hour  when  there  were  two  little  children  for  him  to  feed 
at  eventide ;  and  as  his  fancies  filled  the  pathless  days 
and  nights  of  imagination  with  the  presence  and  wander- 
ings of  the  child  whom  he  had  lost,  grief  took  possession 
of  him. 

Caspar's  life  was  more  solitary  than  ever  before,  now 
that  the  little  Ami  had  been  captured  and  carried  away ; 
and  as  he  thought  of  it,  a  big  tear  ran  down  his  great 
rough  cheek,  and  fell,  like  a  drop  of  liquid  silver,  amid 
the  hair  of  gold. 

His  had  been  a  life  in  whose  lights  and  shadows  there 
had  been  much  pathos  and  poetry.  Born  here,  in  the 
midst  of  these  scenes,  his  youth  had  been  nurtured  upon 
the  most  vitalizing  food  for  mind  and  spirit.  His  father, 
Henri  Perrin,  had  feared  and  loved  Almighty  God ;  and 
this  made  him  a  freeman  in  his  very  soul.  Henri's  re- 
ligious life  had  been  influenced  by  the  inspiring  name 
and  works  of  Peter  Waldo  of  Lyons.  His  youth  was 
that  of  a  Waldensian  at  Lyons ;  and  his  manhood  had 
been  passed  in  the  mountains,  in  constant  expectation 
that,  being  a  leader  of  the  Waldensians,  his  place  of  resi- 
dence would  be  found  out  and  his  life  sacrificed.  For 
thirty  years  the  father  of  Caspar  had  endured  poverty 
and  exile  with  never  a  murmur.  For  a  generation  he 
had  gladly  confessed  to  his  joy  in  the  mountain  solitudes, 
as  he  remembered  how,  as  a  layman,  he  had  consecrated 
the  sacrament,  and  how,  as  an  honest  man,  he  had  once 


ENTERTAINING  ANGELS   UNAWARES.          31 

refused  to  obey  a  priest  of  vicious  habits.  He  had  told 
Caspar  of  coming  events,  the  prophecy  of  which  the  son 
had  not  forgotten  when,  in  1487,  his  own  sister  fell  under 
the  cruel  crusade  of  Alberto  de  Capitanei.  For  him, 
when  Caspar  was  only  a  boy,  the  priest  had  gone,  and 
the  guide,  or  Barbe",  had  become  his  minister.  In  his 
ecclesiastical  vocabulary  character  had  long  ago  eclipsed 
ordination.  Purgatory  he  denied  absolutely,  and  fasts 
and  festivals  he  abhorred ;  and  Caspar  had  grown  up  to 
hear  the  tread  of  great  coming  events  in  his  father's 
animated  conversations. 

These  convictions  Caspar  had  at  once  learned  to  make 
his  own.  He  had  not  his  father's  calmness  of  temper ; 
and  his  eyes  soon  beheld  scenes  so  atrocious  that  one 
day  he  found  himself  hurried  into  Italy  by  having  obeyed 
his  own  indignant  impulse  to  restrain  their  foe  and  his 
desire  to  save  his  friends;  and  in  1506  he  appeared 
fixed  as  an  exile  in  Venice,  having  failed  in  his  effort, 
utterly  broken  in  hope  and  very  poor  in  purse.  He  had 
soon  married  an  Italian  woman  of  singular  mental  free- 
dom, who  had  accepted  him  suddenly,  after  an  honest 
but  stormy  discussion  of  her  religious  views  with  her 
father,  who  was  then  a  penniless  count.  Caspar  was  at 
the  time  employed  as  a  workman  in  a  press-room  in 
Venice,  —  a  press-room  of  which  the  world  shall  always 
preserve  the  chronicle,  —  and  was  doing  well,  when  his 
wife  died  and  left  Caspar  with  two  little  children  alone 
in  the  great  world. 

When  that  dreadful  event  fell  upon  the  life  of  this 
husband  and  father,  and  he  looked  upon  his  little  ones 
through  such  tears  as  blunders  and  poverty  never  may 
extract  from  human  eyes,  he  was  only  at  the  beginning 
of  such  a  strife  with  his  wife's  father,  Count  Aldani 
Neforzo,  as  was  sure  to  end  in  his  leaving  Venice.  No 
effort  or  threatenings  of  the  count,  who  had  already 
forsaken  his  daughter,  could  persuade  this  Waldensian 


32  MONK  AND  KNIGHT. 

to  obtain  or  to  permit  —  if  possible  to  prevent  —  prayers 
for  the  dead.  Together  they  had  lived  in  a  truer  and 
deeper  faith.  She  should  be  respected  in  her  opinions 
and  piety,  now  that  death  had  intervened. 

The  count  brandished  weapons  of  the  most  effective 
sort  against  the  humble  but  heroic  press-man.  Poor  and 
ill-tempered  as  was  the  count,  his  pedigree  and  un- 
doubted loyalty  to  the  Church  made  the  priesthood  of 
Venice  his  agents  and  slaves.  Even  the  great  employer 
of  Caspar  could  do  nothing,  though  he  should  lose  the 
finest  workman  in  Europe,  —  the  servant  who  in  1502 
had  suggested  the  dolphin  and  anchor  for  titlepages,  the 
hand  which  was  bringing  to  Venice  the  scholars  from  every 
quarter  who  had  seen  the  matchless  "  Demosthenes " 
of  1504.  Assassination,  in  the  person  of  a  closely  cov- 
ered priest,  glared  at  Caspar  one  night  as  he  passed 
from  the  printing  room  into  the  street.  The  powers  of 
the  'Church  in  Venice  were  determined  to  crush  the 
Waldensian ;  and  one  day  Caspar  had  sold  to  his  illus- 
trious employer  a  beautiful  manuscript,  for  which  he  had 
traded  his  rings  to  a  sailor  from  Constantinople  ;  and 
with  his  children  he  hurried  back,  by  aid  of  the  funds 
thus  obtained,  to  the  old  home  in  the  mountains. 

Here  in  his  mountain  home  we  have  found  him,  at  the 
opening  of  this  chapter.  His  wife's  dust  lay  in  Venice ; 
his  hands  were  a  testimony  to  the  fact  that  the  printer 
had  been  lost  in  the  herdsman,  and  the  falling  tear  bore 
witness  to  the  new  sorrow  which  had  befallen  him. 

He  was  living  with  the  memory  of  a  spring  day  which 
seemed  only  yesterday.  Never  had  the  valley  appeared 
so  beautiful  as  on  that  morning  of  which  the  herdsman 
was  then  thinking,  in  whose  dewy  loveliness  he  had  started 
forth  with  little  Ami  and  his  baby  sister,  to  find  the  miss- 
ing goats.  After  he  left  the  little  roof  which  had  shel- 
tered him  and  the  two  children,  it  was  a  joy  to  watch  the 
happy  boy  bound  over  the  dashing  streams  which  worried 


ENTERTAINING  ANGELS   UNAWARES.         33 

their  way  amidst  the  rocks,  and  to  pluck  the  fairest  flowers 
for  the  child,  whom,  for  love's  sake,  Gaspar  carried  in  his 
arms. 

They  had  not  gone  far,  until  the  father's  hand  was  full 
of  flowers,  before  which  the  little  girl's  eyes  were  in  an 
ecstasy.  They  were  strangely  colored  orbs  of  loveliness. 
The  variety  of  their  color  bespoke  a  many-sided  and  rich 
nature.  The  father  could  behold  everything  within  them 
which  in  any  way  influenced  or  grew  'out  of  the  solitary 
but  seething  intellectual  life  which  he  was  living. 

Nothing  so  holds  the  two  realms  —  that  of  revelation 
which  satisfies,  that  of  mystery  which  charms  and  in- 
spires —  as  human  eyes  behind  and  within  which  lives  a 
soul.  Gaspar  saw  in  that  child  the  whole  majestic  move- 
ment which  he  felt  in  his  own  breast. 

He  had  named  her  Alke,  "  yearning ;  "  and  in  those 
peculiarly  eloquent  eyes  there  was  such  longing,  in  her 
very  cry  such  a  persistent  and  hopeful  struggle  seemed  to 
be  uttering  itself,  so  often  in  her  babyhood  she  seemed 
to  be  gathering  invisible  sheaves  from  ideal  harvest  fields, 
so  constantly  now  the  lucent  depth  of  her  eye  was  but  an 
indication  of  how  far  beyond  her  environment  it  sent  its 
searching  aspiration,  that  he  was  sure  that  she  had  been 
well  named.  The  tremendous  energies  of  the  Renais- 
sance were  leaping  lightning-like  about  the  printing-room 
of  Aldus  Manutius,  in  Venice,  when  he  quit  work  that 
night  to  go  home  and  call  her  Alke  !  The  resistless  cry 
of  the  human  soul  for  light  and  leading,  which  was  then 
echoing  over  Germany  and  Switzerland,  was  pathetic  in 
its  longing,  as  he  pressed  her  to  his  breast  on  the  night 
her  mother  died,  and  felt  in  his  very  soul  that  this  child 
was  somehow  bound  up  in  destiny  with  the  soul's  de- 
mand,—  Alke,  "  yearning." 

Love  had  been  wedded  to  learning,  and  religion  had 
been  allied  with  reform,  in  that  name  ;  and  the  child  had 
a  piteous  sacredness  that  morning,  when  the  little  boy, 

VOL.  I.  —  3 


34  MONK  AND  KNIGHT. 

with  proud  affection,  placed  in  her  baby  fingers  a  fringed 
gentian,  blue  as  the  sky  above.  And  Caspar  wondered 
if  all  the  tumult  and  strife  of  many  swift  and  antagonistic 
streams  would  ever  press  upon  the  brain  and  strain  the 
heart  of  Alke.  As  he  felt  the  grandeur  of  the  crisis  at 
which  he  knew  Europe  had  arrived,  he  unconsciously 
kissed  the  rosy  lips  of  the  child  in  his  arms,  called 
the  boy  from  the  edge  of  the  abyss  down  into  whose 
deeps  he  was  gazing,  and  kissed  him  likewise,  again 
and  again,  and  then  he  stood  listening  for  the  wandering 
goats. 

Alas,  what  a  thrill  of  pain  shot  through  his  very  soul, 
as  he  kissed  that  strong  and  beautiful  boy  !  It  was  the 
strange  horror  of  impending  danger  which  made  him 
kiss  him  the  second  time. 

Caspar  could  now  detect  that  same  pain  about  his 
heart  still,  as  he  sat  there  on  that  winter  night,  thinking 
it  all  over. 

He  remembered  so  vividly  his  saying  to  the  baby, 
"  Ami,  dear  little  brother,  Ami !  "  and  looking  at  the 
innocent  ignorance  of  Alke.  He  was  not  disappointed 
either ;  for  the  child  did  smile,  drop  her  fringed  gentian, 
and  she  patted  the  boy's  cheek. 

Ami  was  twelve  years  of  age  on  that  very  day,  and  the 
father  could  not  forget  how  he  sat  on  a  rock,  which  he 
saw  had  fallen  lately  from  the  height  above,  beholding 
the  two  playing  together,  —  the  boy  so  proud  of  the  love 
with  which  this  sweet  three-year  old  caressed  him.  He 
remembered  it  all.  The  walk  to  the  cottage  of  his  friend, 
Nirval  Arnaud's  home,  where  the  little  Alke  was  left  with 
the  old  grandmother;  the  whole  past  was  so  real  that 
now  and  then,  as  he  sat  there,  his  feet  moved,  and  the 
child  on  his  breast  was  wakeful.  The  enthusiasm  of 
Ami's  spirit  and  the  ardor  of  his  more  boyish  imagina- 
tions had  heard  the  goats  up  the  mountain-side ;  but  oh, 
the  terrible  cry  of  the  mountaineers,  as  a  few  of  them 


ENTERTAINING  ANGELS  UNAWARES.         35 

shouted  the  news  of  the  attack  !  Even  yet  it  almost  lifted 
Caspar  from  his  seat,  as  he  remembered  it. 

It  was  the  third  charge  of  the  papal  cohorts  within  a 
year  upon  the  Waldensians.  Down  they  came,  without 
pity,  robbing  the  homes  of  fathers  and  sons,  burning  cot- 
tages, stabbing  old  men  suspected  of  heresy,  sparing  only 
the  aged  women  and  the  infants,  —  all  in  the  name  of 
the  Holy  Church  ! 

Caspar  lived  it  all  over  again,  as  he  sat  with  Alke  in 
his  arms ;  and  the  tear  which  fell  into  the  golden  hair 
was  only  one  of  a  multitude  which  had  fallen  from  the 
eyes  which  on  that  fatal  day  beheld  one  of  that  cohort 
—  a  French  soldier  who  was  clad  as  a  knight  —  seize  the 
terrified  boy,  who  clung  to  his  wounded  father,  tear  him 
away,  and  strapping  the  child  to  his  saddle,  ride  afar 
toward  the  valley,  while  the  hills  echoed  with  the  hoof- 
beats  of  his  horse  and  Ami's  pathetic  crying. 

Ami  was  lost.  The  great  gashes  upon  Caspar's  fore- 
arms were  testimonies  of  the  fierceness  of  the  struggle. 
The  child  had  died  on  the  way  to  Paris ;  so  Caspar  had 
found  out,  on  his  own  recovery. 

Ami  thereafter  had  been  but  a  holy  memory,  a  stolen 
hope.  The  infernal  power  which  had  captured  his  boy 
and  panted  for  Caspar's  life  was  left,  —  so  was  Alke  ;  so 
also  the  Lord  God  Omnipotent.  After  all,  he  was  not 
alone. 

It  had  grown  dark  while  Caspar  had  recalled  these 
events ;  and  the  little  golden  head  had  fallen  over  upon 
the  strong  arm,  which  now  lifted  her  a  trifle  without  dis- 
turbing the  delicious  sleep  into  which  the  child  had 
fallen. 

"  How  beautiful  it  is,"  thought  Caspar,  "  that,  at  least 
for  a  time  in  this  life,  a  human  being  may  fall  asleep  in 
the  very  presence  of  sleepless  forces  which  arrange  revo- 
lutions !  "  And  just  as  he  had  muttered  this  to  his  half- 
wakened  soul,  he  saw  through  the  shadows  which  fell 


36  MONK  AND  KNIGHT. 

thickly  upon  the  snows,  two  men  on  horseback  approach- 
ing his  door. 

Little  did  the  Waldensian  know  that  the  word  "  revo- 
lution," which  had  just  escaped  his  lips,  would  never  be 
pronounced  in  after  centuries  save  with  the  recollection 
of  one  of  those  tired  travellers,  and  that  he  who  was  to 
be  his  guest  that  night  had  already  done  something  to 
loosen  the  vast  masses  which  would  sweep,  like  the  ava- 
lanche which  Caspar  saw  the  day  before,  over  the  enor- 
mous area  of  human  thought,  and  leave  it  ready  for  fresh 
growths  and  a  new  civilization. 

As  the  strangers  neared  the  cottage,  Caspar  slowly 
arose ;  and  with  the  tenderness  of  a  mother,  he  put  the 
little  child  on  the  cot  nearest  the  open  fire,  which  threw 
its  streams  of  brilliant  light  out  on  the  snow  when  he 
opened  the  door. 


CHAPTER   II. 

STRANGERS  AND    FELLOW- CITIZENS. 

True  dignity  abides  with  him  alone 
Who,  in  the  hour  of  silent  thought, 
Can  still  suspect  and  still  revere  himself. 

WORDSWORTH. 

'"T^WO  travellers,"  said  the  servant,  who  had  alighted, 

JL  "who  are  not  sure  of  their  way,  and  who  will 
hope  to  find  the  best  pass  through  the  mountains  by  day, 
beseech  you,  good  friend,  to  allow  them  to  remain  with 
you  until  morning." 

Caspar  had  once  been  lost  in  those  mountains;  and 
his  experience  and  sympathy  opened  his  heart  and  home. 
But  before  he  could  say  a  single  word,  his  mind  was  em- 
ploying itself  in  detecting  tones  in  that  voice  like  those 
he  had  heard  so  often  at  Venice,  on  the  liquid  streets,  in 
the  boats,  and  especially  in  the  printing-room  of  Aldus. 
It  was  not  light  enough  for  him  to  attempt  to  make 
new  acquaintances  or  to  identify  old  ones,  but  he  had 
certainly  noticed  a  familiar  method  of  pronunciation. 

"What  I  have,"  said  Caspar, "  is  certainly  at  the  dis- 
posal of  any  who  on  such  a  night  and  in  such  deep 
snows  travel  these  mountain  roads.  Will  you  both  come 
into  my  cottage?  " 

"  I  must  thank  you,  my  kind  man !  "  said  the 
other  traveller,  in  dignified  and  somewhat  lofty  tones. 


38  MONK  AND  KNIGHT. 

"  This  surely  is  not  courtesy,  but  the  very  essence  of 
humanity." 

As  he  alighted,  Caspar  was  thinking  where  he  had 
heard  that  voice.  A  hundred  Venetians  might  have  pro- 
nounced words,  as  did  the  servant  who  spoke  first,  but 
he  had  never  but  once  heard  a  voice  so  full  of  culture,  so 
eloquent  with  refinement,  so  suggestive  of  quiet  power, 
as  that  which  had  just  spoken,  —  never  but  once ;  and 
then  in  that  dear  old  press-room  at  Venice,  when  one 
day  with  his  eminent  master,  Aldus,  he  had  looked,  with 
one  who  was  a  stranger  to  him  at  that  hour,  at  a  rare 
manuscript. 

"  It  cannot  be,"  whispered  Caspar,  "  that  I  have  lost 
my  wits  in  this  solitude,  and  that  this  memory  of  Venice 
makes  my  very  ears  its  victim." 

"  I  will  attend  to  the  horses  very  soon,  when  I  am  a 
little  warmed,"  said  the  servant ;  and  behind  the  master, 
who  walked  slowly  and  with  evident  weakness,  he  came 
into  the  little  home  which  fairly  glowed  with  welcome. 

"  Strangers  that  you  are,"  said  the  host,  "  I  can  prom- 
ise you  some  food,  if  it  will  not  offend  you  to  partake 
with  me  of  bread  made  by  my  own  hands ;  "  and  he  made 
his  way  toward  a  huge  jar  which  contained  the  provisions 
of  the  home. 

A  two-branched  candlestick  of  peculiar  beauty  stood 
by  the  little  sundial  with  which  the  child  had  been 
amused  that  afternoon;  and  it  soon  bore  two  lights, 
which  revealed  many  more  of  the  curious  and  interest- 
ing contents  of  this  interior. 

"  Where  could  this  mountaineer  have  obtained  such 
a  piece  of  household  furniture  as  this?"  silently  queried 
the  dignified  stranger,  as  he  beheld  saucepans  piled 
upon  a  metal  boiler,  and  by  its  side  a  ewer  of  Oriental 
origin,  and  a  pitcher,  on  which  had  been  copied  with 
artistic  accuracy  the  scene  of  the  burning  of  Girolamo 
Savonarola  in  St.  Mark's,  Florence. 


STRANGERS  AND  FELLOW-CITIZENS.          39 

"  This,"  added  he,  in  the  silence  of  his  thoughts,  "  is 
more  like  Florence  than  anything  I  have  seen  since  leav- 
ing ; "  and  speaking  aloud,  he  said,  "  My  good  friend,  I 
beg  you  know  that  whatever  you  have  will  be  gratefully 
eaten  by  one  so  dependent  on  your  hospitality  and  so 
fond  as  I  am  of  your  Piedmontese  food." 

Forthwith  Caspar  produced  a  loaf  of  acorn  bread,  and 
proceeded  to  make  a  stew  of  rabbit  and  herbs,  the  very 
odor  of  which  was  a  full  meal  to  the  -youth,  who  by  this 
time  had  provided  for  the  horses. 

"  Never  was  prince  better  fed,"  was  the  remark  of  the 
older  traveller,  as  he  was  half  startled  by  finding  beneath 
his  hands,  on  the  table  where  stood  the  bowl  which 
Alke  had  but  just  emptied,  a  copy,  exquisite,  clear,  and 
especially  well  bound,  of  the  "  Herone  et  Leandro  "  of 
Musaeus,  printed  by  Aldus  in  1494. 

Could  it  be  possible  that  he  was  in  a  fairy  realm  ?  The 
only  copy  he  had  seen,  outside  of  that  famous  printing- 
room  of  Aldus,  was  held  carefully  in  the  hand  of  Lorenzo 
de  Medici's  intellectual  councillor  and  vicegerent,  Pico 
della  Mirandola.  He  dropped  his  bit  of  acorn  bread, 
which  he  was  eating,  as  his  mind  turned  from  that  poor 
man's  home,  with  its  smells  of  bacon,  bouilleux,  pot- 
pourri, and  garlic,  to  the  palace  of  Lorenzo,  where  the 
learned  and  elegant  Pico  pored  over  his  costly  cabalistic 
manuscripts,  and  patted  gently  the  "  Herone  et  Lean- 
dro," with  which  Aldus  Manutius  had  favored  him. 

It  was  now  the  turn  of  the  stranger  to  wonder  where 
in  the  world  he  had  aforetime  seen  this  man,  his  host. 
Something  about  the  man  took  him  back  to  the  press- 
room of  Aldus.  He  could  almost  see  him  there,  amidst 
the  newly  discovered  manuscripts  and  the  workmen. 
Then,  the  drawing  on  the  pitcher,  —  that  was  the  Flor- 
ence of  Savonarola's  day,  an  excited,  mob-ruled,  offen- 
sive Florence,  from  which  every  characteristic  of  the 
wondering  man  turned  away. 


40  MONK  AND  KNIGHT. 

"  Ah,"  he  thought,  "  Savonarola's  death  pictured  in 
this  man's  home  !  I  see  it  all.  He  is  a  Waldensian  ! 
I  am  in  the  home  of  one  of  the  men  who  have  for  so 
long  made  this  furor  about  reforming  the  Church." 

He  was  thinking  it  over,  while  the  youth  who  was  his 
attendant  was  making  some  general  remarks  about  the 
city  of  Turin  and  the  snows  which  they  had  encountered 
on  their  way,  when,  at  length,  something  occurred  which 
made  him  sure  that  the  roof  of  a  radical  and  intense 
Waldensian  was  over  his  head. 

The  door  had  opened,  and  without  ceremony  a  wild- 
eyed,  ill-tempered  old  woman  had  entered,  holding  a 
huge  wooden  cross  before  her  noisy  tongue.  She  did  not 
notice  either  of  the  strangers,  but  proceeded  to  berate 
the  man  of  the  house  with  bitterness  and  curses,  while  she 
attempted  to  pound  him  with  this  pious  emblem. 

"  Stop  !  "  said  Caspar,  in  a  loud  whisper.  "  Don't  wake 
little  Alke ;  she  is  just  asleep.  I  will  give  you  justice. 
Away  with  your  missile  !  "  as  she  threw  it  at  him  with  all 
ner  power. 

"  I  '11  have  you  cursed  by  the  priest  on  the  hill ;  and 
Saint  Bridget  herself  will  dry  up  your  cows,  and  little  Alke 
will  starve  !  I  '11  tell  the  holy  friars  that  you  're  hereti- 
cal, and  you  will  be  burned  alive  !  " 

This  last  sentence  she  fairly  shouted,  while  the  baby 
slept  sweetly,  and  the  kind  but  irritated  Caspar  pushed 
her  toward  the  door,  and  gently  held  her  with  one 
hand,  while  with  his  other  strong  hand  he  gathered  up 
the  pieces  of  the  broken  cross.  Soon  he  had  compelled 
her  to  leave  her  curses  behind. 

"  My  friends,"  said  the  host,  after  he  had  closed  the 
door,  "  I  know  you  must  feel  that  you  have  found  an 
insecure  lodging  for  the  night.  I  am  sure  I  cannot  help 
this  noisy  creature  from  visiting  me  in  this  way.  I  must 
tell  you,  and  I  believe  you,"  looking  straight  at  the  dig- 
nified stranger,  who  had  his  hand  on  the  "  Herone  et 


STXAATGERS  AND   FELLOW-CITIZENS.          41 

Leandro,"  —  "I  believe  you  are  a  gentleman  of  intel- 
ligence ;  this  woman  is  —  or  rather  let  me  begin  with  my- 
self—  I  am  not  of  her  faith,  as  you  see.  She  was  my 
only  help  and  the  child's  guardian,  while  I  looked  after 
the  herds.  I  resolved  yesterday  to  dismiss  her.  You 
may  not  share  my  opinions  about  matters  of  faith  and 
doctrine,  but  I  am  not  a  believer  in  Saint  Bridget,  nor 
do  I  fear  her  influence  with  my  cows.  This  woman  had 
begun  to  teach  my  little  child  what  are- to  me  the  super- 
stitions of  men." 

Caspar  had  gone  farther  than  he  had  meant  to  go. 
These  men  might  be  spies,  the  forerunners  of  another  of 
Leo's  legions  of  extermination.  He  saw  it  all ;  but  he 
faltered  not.  He  was  about  to  tell  them  what  had  oc- 
curred, when  the  man,  whose  hand  had  rested  uneasily 
upon  the  book,  spoke,  — 

"  My  worthy  host,  will  you  fear  not  ?  But  —  you  are 
a  Waldensian  !  " 

"  I  am"  answered  Caspar,  and  he  looked  the  heroic 
soul  he  was,  —  "I  am  ;  and  I  am  so  much  a  hater  of 
these  monkish  mutterings,  that  when  this  woman  sat 
milking  in  the  cow-house,  saying, '  God  and  Saint  Bridget 
bless  you  !  '  in  order  that  she  might  save  her  head  and 
the  milk,  I  resolved  to  do  the  milking  myself." 

The  stranger  was  astonished  at  his  humorous  and  vig- 
orous language,  and  again  the  press-room  of  Aldus  came 
before  his  eyes ;  but  he  took  up  the  other  picture  with 
Saint  Bridget  in  the  foreground. 

"  I  shall  be  permitted  to  say  that  your  confession  of 
faith  is  safe  in  my  keeping.  We  are  not  spies  of  the 
Holy  Church ;  and  on  my  soul,  I  am  glad  to  be  lost,  if 
I  may  stay  with  such  a  frank  heretic  until  morning.  I 
can  imagine  that  one  who  cares  for  a  thing  of  this  kind," 
holding  up  the  book,  "  cannot  fear  the  maledictions  of 
Saint  Bridget." 

Caspar  had  forgotten  to  put  this  book  back  in  its 


42  MONK  AND  KNIGHT. 

place,  with  other  most  precious  volumes ;  and  he  was 
disconcerted  when  he  saw  the  excited  eye  of  his  guest, 
as  he  held  the  little  volume  in  his  trembling  hand.  The 
mountaineer  now  became  quite  oblivious  of  the  incident 
with  the  discharged  servant,  though  he  knew  such  an 
event  as  her  discharge  would  probably  arouse  the  priests 
to  arrange  another  attack.  He  was  fascinated  with  the 
sight  of  a  man  who  understood  the  significance  of  such 
a  fact  as  the  discovery  of  that  book  in  these  scenes; 
he  was  also  sure  that  he  had  seen  that  same  eye  kindle 
at  least  once  before  amidst  associations  of  learning. 
For  the  moment  Caspar  was  tongue-tied.  He  did  not 
dare1  to  ask  the  name  of  his  guest ;  and  he  had  re- 
solved to  hide  his  own  identity,  if  possible.  Surely  there 
was  enough  beside  their  own  names  which  these  two 
men  could  talk  about. 

"  Will  you  let  me  know  just  where  we  are?  "  asked  the 
youth.  "  We  set  out  from  Turin ;  and  we  are  only  sure 
of  one  thing,  that  we  are  glad  to  be  here,  although,  as  my 
master  says,  we  are  lost  in  the  mountains." 

Caspar  quickly  saw  that  here  were  a  scholar  and  his 
student,  who  were  gracefully  accepting  the  inevitable  an- 
noyances of  such  an  experience ;  and  he  was  resolved 
to  be  interesting  and  instructive  as  far  as  possible.  He 
summoned  his  rusty  scholarship  to  the  task. 

"This  mountain,"  said  he,  "is  the  Vesulus  of  Virgil. 
Do  you  remember?" 

"  Indeed  !  "  interrupted  the  master ;  and  with  great- 
est interest  he  quoted  the  words,  — 

" .  .  .  De  Montibus  altis 
Actus  aper,  multa  Vesulus  quern  pinifer  annos 
Defendit." 

Caspar  was  now  sorry  that  he  had  thought  it  neces- 
sary to  conceal  his  identity ;  but  it  was  evident  that  the 
scholar  wished  to  remain  unknown  to  his  host.  Truly 
there  never  had  been  an  hour  in  the  life  of  this  kindly  host 


STRANGERS  AND  FELLOW-CITIZENS.          43 

when  he  wanted  so  badly  to  break  every  law  of  courtesy 
and  ask  for  a  name. 

"  You  beheld  the  summit  on  the  left,  as  you  came  out 
of  Turin?"  said  Caspar. 

"  Yes  ;  and  we  are  now  a  long  distance  from  our  route 
toward  England,"  answered  the  youth. 

"We  are  not  far  from  good  things,"  said  his  master; 
and  turning  to  the  mountaineer,  he  asked,  "  Did  you 
ever  hear  of  a  manuscript  of  Virgil,  in  the  Capuchin 
Monastery  on  the  hill  ?  ' ' 

"  I  have  heard  of  nothing  from  the  priests,  save  what  I 
learned  from  one,  a  Venetian,  a  noble  man,  who  did  love 
books  and  detest  monkish  fables,  who  died  of  wounds 
when  I  lost  my  boy." 

"  Ah,  good  man,  your  own  son  ?  Do  not  allow  us  to 
invade  your  private  woes.  But  it  is  a  fresh  sorrow,  I  am 
sure." 

Caspar  had  found  intellectual  and  spiritual  sym- 
pathy at  the  same  moment ;  and  anxious  as  he  was 
to  hide  his  own  name,  he  told  the  story  of  the  attack 
of  the  French  cohorts  of  the  Pope  and  of  the  capture 
of  Ami. 

Tears  coursed  down  cheeks  which  in  biographical  por- 
traiture have  never  been  celebrated  for  the  presence 
of  anything  like  tears  upon  them.  A  heart  which  often 
seems  to  the  reader  of  his  life  strangely  empty  of  human 
sympathy,  responded  to  this  tale,  especially  when  the 
mountaineer  seemed  to  forget  his  surroundings,  and 
said,  — 

"  I  hoped  to  see  my  boy  a  great  printer,  like  Aldus 
Manutius,  and  I  was  promised  a  manuscript  of  Virgil  by 
Fra  Latrano ;  but  the  boy  is  dead,  and  the  monks  have 
concealed  the  parchment." 

"  My  dear  man,"  said  the  scholar,  "  our  lives  have 
met  at  vital  and  exciting  points.  I  have  journeyed  many 
miles  —  I  beg  you,  do  not  ask  my  name  —  with  this  my 


44  MONK  AND  KNIGHT. 

youthful  student  to  find  and  copy  that  very  parchment. 
I  have  letters  from  Pope  Julius  II." 

"  Ah,"  said  Caspar,  "  we  fear  those  who  carry  the 
messages  or  commands  of  his  Holiness ;  they  are  swords 
for  our  hearts  !  "  and  he  listened,  as  often  had  the  Pied- 
montese,  to  hear  the  shouts  of  persecuting  cavalry. 

"  I  do  not  like  a  state  of  things  in  which  an  honest 
man  who  loves  books  trembles  for  his  life,"  said  the 
master. 

"  But  books  and  honesty  are  dangerous  companions 
now  in  these  mountains.  I  could  wish  you  were  where 
you  might  not  be  murdered,  at  any  moment,  for  the 
crime  of  simply  saying  what  you  have  said.  That  is 
called  heresy  in  these  mountains,"  answered  the  host. 

"  It  is  heresy,  damnable  heresy,"  said  the  scholar,  "  to 
stifle  honest  thinking,  to  seize  a  child,  carry  him  off  to 
death,  and  hide  the  literature  of  Greece  and  Rome." 

Caspar  felt  the  breath  of  both  the  Renaissance  and 
the  Reformation  in  his  humble  home.  He  knew  he  was 
entertaining  a  great  man ;  but  he  saw  what  the  world  was 
soon  to  find  out,  —  that  this  man's  interest  was  in  ideas 
and  in  scholarship,  rather  than  in  purposes  and  deeds. 

Could  it  be  that  this  man  was  the  already  illustrious 
Erasmus  of  Rotterdam? 

"  Let  us  talk  of  the  manuscripts  in  the  morning,"  said 
the  tired  scholar,  feeling  that  it  was  necessary  for  him  to 
rest,  but  feeling  still  more  keenly  that  he  had  another 
page  on  the  ignorance  of  monks,  which  he  would  not 
forget,  to  add  to  those  he  had  already  written  on  horse- 
back and  in  inns,  as  they  had  been  wandering  from  the 
route  toward  England. 

Caspar  could  not  sleep  that  night.  He  resolved  to 
tell  the  whole  story  of  priestcraft,  as  he  knew  it,  to  a  man 
whom  he  never  suspected  of  being  still  in  holy  orders, 
of  whom  he  had  no  slightest  hint  that  in  his  pockets 
were  pages,  closely  written,  crowded  with  such  satire  on 


STKANGEKS  AND  FELLOW-CITIZENS.          45 

monks  as  would  make  the  world  laugh  and  grow  furious 
for  at  least  three  centuries. 

"  Certainly,"  he  thought,  "  I  can  find  out  what  is  doing 
in  the  world,  to  make  it  less  dark  and  less  superstitious 
and  cruel ;  I  will  get  this,  at  least,  from  my  guest  when 
he  wakes." 

Little  Alke  alone  slept  soundly. 

"  Surely,"  said  the  sleepy  scholar,  "  this  is  Perrin,  the 
best  printer  of  Venice.  He  was  the  pride  of  Aldus  Ma- 
nutius,  —  the  man  for  whom  he  is  yet  mourning,  the 
man  who  had  to  leave  Venice  to  keep  his  life,  the  man 
for  whose  blood  Count  Aldani  Neforzo  set  a  hundred 
priests  in  search.  I  can  comfort  him  on  the  morrow 
with  news  of  light.  A  better  day  is  dawning." 


CHAPTER   III. 

A   RECOGNIZED   GUEST. 

"  Far  o'er  the  steep  the  chalet  glances  dim, 
Through  clouds  that  gather  on  the  glacier's  rim, 
And  here  a  cataract  in  maniac  wrath 
And  share  of  foam  ploughs  up  its  furious  path, 
But  drained  from  fountains  of  eternal  snow, 
Converts  to  flowers  the  verdant  vale  below." 

MORNING,  as  splendid  as  the  fairest  dream,  broke 
upon  the  mountains.  Far  and  wide  the  daytime 
unfurled  radiant  banners  upon  the  everlasting  hills,  and 
the  valleys  were  vast  basins  full  of  purple  and  crimson 
light.  Monte  Viso,  white  and  inaccessible,  caught  the 
whole  pageant,  and  detained  it  long  upon  her  fiery  crest. 
Lonely  and  majestic,  Mont  Cenis  answered  with  streamers 
of  light.  The  great  river  shone  like  a  flashing  streak  of 
gold.  The  pines,  of  which  Virgil  sang,  were  hung  with 
silver.  Bells  tinkled  on  the  resonant  air,  and  their  music 
floated  upward  along  the  glassy  steeps  of  hard  snow. 
Everything  became  sublime  to  Caspar,  as  he  walked  to 
the  cow-shed  without  a  fear  of  Saint  Bridget  in  his  ample 
soul. 

When  the  scholar  had  risen  and  made  himself  ready 
for  the  day's  journey,  he  found  that  the  "  Herone  et  Lean- 
dro  "  had  disappeared ;  and  he  discovered  further,  to  his 
soul's  amazement,  that  a  copy  of  the  "  Dante  "  of  1481, 


A   RECOGNIZED   GUEST.  47 

by  Baldini,  occupied  its  place,  next  to  the  bowl,  which 
had  been  washed  thoroughly  in  the  mean  time. 

"  We  are  in  the  home  of  a  most  remarkable  man," 
said  the  master  to  his  pupil,  —  for  such  he  was ;  "  and  I 
am  confounded  by  the  appearance  of  this  '  Dante.'  I 
had  as  soon  expected  a  ghost." 

The  pupil  said  nothing,  for  he  was  still  asleep ;  and 
the  scholar  soon  saw  that  little  Alke  and  he  were  dividing 
sweetmeats  at  the  feast  of  slumber. 

The  nervous  scholar,  however,  chattered  on  :  "  These 
marks  are  such  as  nobody  but  a  Waldensian  would 
make.  Every  line  which  scores  the  priests  is  noted  ; 
every  page  which  stabs  the  Church  is  dog's-eared.  A 
scholar  and  a  heretic  ! "  and  his  eye  then  rested  upon 
that  page  in  which  Dante  describes  Benedict  among 
the  heads  of  the  Holy  Church :  — 

•'  .  .  .  My  rule 

Is  left  a  profitless  stain  upon  the  leaves; 
The  walls,  for  abbeys  reared,  turned  into  dens  ; 
The  cowls  to  sacks  are  choked  up  with  musty  meal. 
Foul  usury  doth  not  more  lift  itself 
Against  God's  pleasure,  than  that  fruit  which  makes 
The  hearts  of  monks  so  wanton." 

When  Caspar  came  in,  with  a  pail  so  full  of  milk  that 
it  was  a  task  to  keep  the  treasure  within  its  bounds,  the 
scholar  saluted  him  with  such  attentive  courtesy  as  made 
Caspar  feel  again  the  atmosphere  of  the  Venetian  printing- 
room  ;  and  instead  of  saying  the  pleasant  things  he  had 
resolved  upon  in  the  cow-house,  he  stood  perfectly  silent, 
with  the  smells  of  the  stable  upon  him,  the  bucket  still  in 
his  hand,  while  before  his  brain  came  the  scene  in  the 
house  of  Aldus  that  night  in  1503,  on  which  the  great 
printer  received  word  that  the  "  Hercules  Ferens "  of 
Euripides  had  been  discovered.  The  second  volume  of 
the  Euripides  had  gone  to  press.  The  printer  was  beset 
with  doubt  as  to  the  genuineness  of  the  manuscript,  and 
as  to  the  advisability  of  including  the  play  in  that  edition. 


48  MONK  AND  KNIGHT. 

Caspar  still  held  to  the  milk-pail,  and  stood  stupidly, 
as  it  afterward  seemed  to  him,  staring  backward  over 
the  years  and  into  the  fine  face  of  Aldus.  He  was  re- 
membering how  much  Aldus  desired  on  that  night  the 
privilege  of  a  single  hour  with  that  manuscript  in  the 
presence  of  Erasmus.  And  now  Caspar  really  believed 
that  Erasmus  was  bowing  to  him  in  his  own  cottage. 

"  I  hope  you  did  not  find  Saint  Bridget  interfering 
with  the  heels  of  your  cows,"  said  the  scholarly  stranger. 

"  No,"  answered  the  new  milkmaid,  "  Saint  Bridget 
seems  to  have  left  the  premises.  The  udders  of  the 
cows  were  never  more  full." 

The  morning  meal  was  excellent,  if  the  eating  could 
be  regarded  as  proof  of  the  pudding.  Alke  waked, 
smiled,  and  prattled,  while  the  scholar  tried  to  be  pleas- 
ant to  the  little  one,  and  at  the  same  time  to  discover 
the  name  of  this  interesting  man.  Never  did  two  men 
more  laboriously  seek  to  remain  unrecognized  each  to  the 
other ;  never  were  resistless  sympathies  rendering  the 
accomplishment  of  such  an  end  less  probable.  They 
fully  canvassed  the  subject  of  the  manuscripts,  until  it  was 
evident  that  for  some  reason  the  stranger  wanted  to  drop 
the  subject. 

"Your  mountain  has  been  celebrated  by  Virgil,  and 
Dante  has  come  into  your  cottage,"  said  the  stranger. 

"  Yes,''  answered  the  host.  "  Virgil  and  Dante  were 
both  prophets,  though  one  was  a  Pagan  and  the  other  a 
Christian.  When  I  was  once  in  Mantua,  I  heard  the  ser- 
vice in  church  on  St.  Paul's  day.  You  know  the  hymn 
which  contains  Saint  Paul's  words,  spoken  when  he 
looked  at  Virgil's  tomb :  — 

'  Ad  Maronis  Mausoleum 
Ductus,  fudit  super  eum 
Piae  rorem  lacrymae ; 
Quern  te,  inquit  reddidissem 
Si  te  vivum  invenissem 
Poetarum  maxime.' 


A   RECOGNIZED   GUEST.  49 

Virgil  could  never  have  written  the  fourth  eclogue 
without  having  read  Isaiah.  Dante  is  like  enough  to 
that  Hebrew  iconoclast.  I  was  told  by  one  who  knows 
the  painter  that  when  somebody  upbraided  Michael  An- 
gelo  for  sketching  Julius,  the  Holy  Father,  in  hell  on  the 
ceiling  of  his  own  chapel,  he  replied  that  Dante  had  done 
as  ill  by  putting  a  pope  in  hell  in  his  poetry.  The  change 
which  Dante  prophesies  may  be  almost  as  great  as  that 
which  Virgil  saw  coming." 

"  Scarcely,"  said  the  conservative  stranger.  "  One 
was  the  dawn  of  a  new  faith;  this  will  be  only  a  peace- 
ful transformation  of  opinions  about  the  old  one." 

"  It  is  not  peaceful  here,"  said  Caspar ;  and  he  held 
up  his  arms  hacked  by  the  butchers  who  had  torn  away 
his  child. 

"  I  sympathize  with  you,"  replied  the  scholar,  with  that 
same  halting,  equivocal,  rationalistic  fervor  which  never 
allowed  him  either  to  spare  the  Holy  Church  or  to  ac- 
cept the  cause  of  the  Reformers,  —  "I  sympathize  with 
you  in  your  sufferings,  but  the  reform  must  come  slowly." 

"Did  you  ever  see  an  avalanche  move  slowly?"  asked 
the  Waldensian.  "  Friend  !  there  are  too  many  winds  in 
the  mountains,  and  great  steeps  running  downward  into 
untold  depths.  This  avalanche  which  has  been  loosened 
will  not  stop  for  anything." 

"  Do  you  believe  an  avalanche  is  really  loosened,  that 
the  Church  and  the  world  are  to  suffer  from  a  revolu- 
tion ?  "  asked  the  stranger,  as  he  put  particular  emphasis 
on  the  suffering  which  would  come  with  such  an  event  as 
Caspar  seemed  to  contemplate. 

A  peculiar  gesture  made  Caspar  sure  that  he  was 
entertaining  Erasmus.  The  earnest  Waldensian  felt  now 
that  the  moment  had  come.  He  had  forgotten  about 
the  manuscripts  for  which  this  scholar  and  his  student 
had  travelled  to  Turin ;  and  now  he  believed  that  he 
could  compel  his  guest  to  disclose  his  name.  He  stepped 
VOL.  i.  —  4 


5O  MONK  AND  KNIGHT. 

to  a  little  box  which  had  served  as  a  trunk  in  his  travels 
from  Venice  to  his  mountain  home ;  and  he  seized  with 
trembling  hands  a  book  which  he  held  up  before  the 
gaze  of  the  wondering  men. 

"This,"  said  he,  as  Alke  toddled  between  his  legs 
laughing  and  chattering,  —  "  this  is  enough  to  break  the 
ice-bands  which  hold  a  glacier.  A  man  who  writes  a 
book  like  this  in  these  times  cannot  help  but  expect  a 
revolution.  Enough  energy  is  here  to  change  things. 
For  these  opinions  stood  my  father  and  his  friends.  We 
have  been  ignorant ;  this  book  is  scholarly.  But  Peter 
Waldo  of  Lyons  saw  this  truth ; "  and  then  the  moun- 
taineer read  with  a  voice  which  had  echoed  through  the 
mountains,  the  brilliant,  sword-like  sentences  which  filled 
the  air  of  that  room  with  lightning  flashes. 

No  book  could  have  so  unfitted  the  scholar  for  an 
argument.  How  quickly  he  recognized  the  phrases  !  It 
was  bewildering;  but  more,  he  was  both  deeply  an- 
noyed and  altogether  amazed.  The  red  flush  came  into 
his  thin  cheeks  as  Caspar  read  the  passages  which  left 
much  of  the  machinery  of  the  Holy  Church  quite  out 
of  account  in  the  development  of  the  Christian  life. 
At  length  Caspar  reached  these  sentences :  "  The  most 
acceptable  service  which  you  can  offer  to  the  Virgin 
Mary  is  to  endeavor  to  imitate  her  humility.  If  you 
must  adore  the  bones  of  Saint  Paul  locked  up  in  a 
casket,  adore  also  the  spirit  of  Saint  Paul  which  shines 
forth  from  his  writings." 

His  voice  sounded  like  a  trumpet.  The  scholar  rose 
and  walked  to  the  closed  door.  Was  it  an  effort  to  have 
him  tell  his  name,  or  to  criticise  his  attitude  toward  the 
Reformers  ? 

Nothing  could  have  more  thoroughly  distinguished  the 
two  men  than  this  fact,  —  whenever  the  mountaineer  read 
the  passages  in  which  Platonic  ideas  of  human  nature  or 
the  Roman  stoicism  figured,  the  guest  was  at  ease ;  but 


A    RECOGNIZED   GUEST.  51 

it  was  then  that  the  host  hurried  on  to  the  sentences 
which  described  the  follies  and  disgraces  of  monkish  life. 
One  saw  the  morning  through  his  brain,  and,  like  a 
Hamlet,  found  his  intellectual  powers  extracting  the 
energy  from  his  will ;  the  other  saw  it  through  his  con- 
science, and  was  at  once  an  heroic  soldier  of  reform. 

Caspar,  still  standing,  read  this  passage  with  much 
force :  "  Tell  me  not  this  is  charity,  to  be  constant  at 
church,  to  prostrate  yourself  before  the  images  of  saints, 
to  burn  wax  candles,  and  to  chant  prayers.  God  has  no 
need  of  these  things.  What  Paul  calls  charity  is  to  edify 
your  neighbor,  to  esteem  all  men  members  of  the  same 
body,  to  think  all  are  one  in  Christ,  to  rejoice  in  the 
Lord  at  your  brother's  welfare  as  if  it  were  your  own,  to 
remedy  his  misfortunes  as  if  they  too  were  your  own, 
to  correct  the  erring  gently,  to  instruct  the  ignorant,  to 
raise  the  fallen,  to  comfort  the  cast-down,  to  assist  them 
that  are  in  trouble,  to  succor  them  that  are  in  want ;  in 
fine,  to  direct  all  your  powers,  all  your  zeal,  all  your 
care  to  this  end,  —  to  do  good  in  Christ  in  all  to  whom 
you  can  do  good,  in  order  that  as  he  was  neither  born 
nor  lived  nor  died  to  himself,  but  gave  himself  wholly 
for  our  advantage,  so  we  also  may  serve  our  brother's 
needs  and  not  our  own.  Were  this  so,  there  would  be  no 
kind  of  life  more  happy  or  more  pleasant  than  that  of 
those  who  have  set  themselves  apart  for  the  service  of 
religion ;  which  now,  on  the  contrary,  we  find  to  be 
severe  and  toilsome,  and  filled  with  Jewish  superstitions, 
nor  free  from  any  of  the  vices  of  the  outer  world ;  in 
some  respects  it  is  even  more  deeply  stained." 

"What,"  said  the  reader,  —  "what  can  stop  the  storm 
which  those  facts  and  truths  will  bring  forth  ?  " 

At  this  the  stranger  seemed  entirely  disconcerted  ;  and 
he  said  nervously,  "That  is  a  strange  book." 

"  Yes,"  replied  Perrin  ;  "  it  is  the  kind  of  book  which 
I  would  expect  a  scholar  to  write.  All  the  forces  of 


52  MONK  AND  KNIGHT. 

scholarship  have  been  melting  the  ice.  The  Church 
has  been  weakening  in  her  authority  before  the  advanc- 
ing noonday  which  scholars  have  inaugurated  by  bringing 
in  Greece  and  Rome  upon  her.  It  does  not  tell  all  the 
truth  ;  but  this  book  means  everything  to  me." 

In  excellent  humor  as  he  was,  Caspar  looked  the 
listener  in  the  face,  and  saw  that  he  was  excited  and 
perplexed. 

"  It  is  full  of  the  kind  of  revolution  which  I  see  plainly 
that  you  are  afraid  of.  Did  you  ever  read  it?"  gravely 
queried  the  Waldensian. 

He  handed  the  volume  to  the  scholar,  and  watched  his 
shrewd  look ;  but  the  mountaineer  had  the  victory.  It 
was  a  copy  of  the  '  Enchiridion,"  —  "The  Christian 
Soldier's  Dagger,"  —  written,  as  they  both  knew,  by 
Desiderius  Erasmus. 

There  was  a  good  deal  of  oppressive  silence  before 
Caspar  went  out  to  help  the  youth  with  his  horses.  The 
man  who  had  just  ordered  them  for  the  day's  journey  did 
not  know  whether  he  wanted  to  go  or  stay.  He  had 
promised  the  youth  not  to  reveal  his  identity.  He  was 
resolved  upon  one  thing  more,  to  say  nothing  further 
about  the  manuscript  to  his  host,  unless  the  subject  came 
up  without  his  effort.  True,  he  was  disappointed  at  not 
finding  it.  They  had  travelled  a  long  distance,  and  on 
the  day  before,  they  had  been  badly  treated  by  the 
Capuchin  monks,  who,  while  they  respected  the  Pope's 
letter,  could  not  bring  themselves  to  tolerate  this  particu- 
lar guest.  Nevertheless,  the  elder  of  the  two  travellers 
concluded  not  to  refer  to  the  subject.  His  mind  was 
sufficiently  employed  on  other  matters.  He  must  at  once 
set  out  toward  England. 

He  had  fallen  quite  in  love  with  this  man  and  his  cot- 
tage. There  was  an  honest  nobility  in  that  curious  cot- 
tager ;  and  the  little  girl  was  beautiful.  As  they  came  to 
the  door  with  the  horses,  Caspar  saw  him  kiss  little  Alke. 


A   RECOGNIZED   GUEST.  53 

"  What  will  this  child  do,  if  this  spiritual  avalanche  does 
sweep  over  Europe  ?  "  thought  the  scholar ;  and  the  child 
smiled  upon  him  as  he  took  the  "  Dante  "  out  of  the  lit- 
tle hands  into  which  it  had  found  its  way,  and  placed 
there  instead  four  bright  coins. 

"  We  are  ready  for  the  day's  journey,"  said  the  youth, 
as  he  entered  the  cottage  and  found  the  scholar  bundled 
up  as  well  as  he  might  be  for  such  "a  contest  with  snow 
and  cold. 

"Scarcely  ready,"  said  the  other,  "until  this  most 
worthy  man  is  paid  as  we  cannot  pay  him." 

"  I  am  remunerated,"  said  Caspar,  "  by  the  honor  you 
have  done  me.  I  am  more  than  paid  by  the  presence  of 
so  much  learning  and  companionship.  Possibly  you  may 
yet  obtain  that  manuscript  of  Virgil.  We  may  never  see 
each  other  again.  With  this  food,  and  these  notes  for 
your  guidance  which  I  have  written,  —  for  your  route  is 
difficult,  —  I  enclose  a  hope  that  you  will  still  melt  the  ice 
and  help  to  loosen  the  avalanche." 

"What,  man?"  said  the  scholar.  "You  still  interest 
and  perplex  me.  What  can  you  signify?  " 

The  mountaineer  smiled  upon  the  disconcerted  scholar, 
as  he  slowly  said,  "  It  is  a  grave  and  shining  hour,  Mas- 
ter !  You  will  have  your  part  to  act  in  this  tragedy.  It 
would  be  a  comedy,  only  a  feeble  comedy,  if  it  were 
only  what  you  seem  to  expect.  Scholar,  and  illustrious 
scholar  that  you  are  —  " 

"  No  ;  you  must  not  mistake  me." 

"  I  do  not,"  said  the  host,  as  the  scholar  mounted  his 
horse.  "  I  was  in  the  room  of  Aldus  once,  and  with  you, 
I  saw  that  Lucca  manuscript.  Farewell,  Erasmus  ! ' ' 

Caspar  was  right. 

The  scholar  smiled,  pulled  the  rein,  stopped  his  horse 
for  another  instant,  and  said,  "  Farewell,  and  Heaven  keep 
you  and  your  child,  Caspar  Perrin  !  " 


CHAPTER   IV. 


AT   AN   ENGLISH   ABBEY. 


"  All  is  silent  now,  —  silent  the  bell 
That,  heard  from  yonder  ivied  turret  high, 
Warned  the  cowled  brother  from  his  midnight  cell; 
Silent  the  vesper  chant,  —  the  Litany, 
Responsive  to  the  organ  :  scattered  lie 
The  wrecks  of  the  proud  pile,  mid  arches  gray ; 
While  hollow  winds  through  mantling  ivy  sigh ; 
And  even  the  mouldering  shrine  is  rent  away, 
Where  in  the  warrior  weeds  the  British  Arthur  lay." 

CLEAR  and  lustrous  was  the  sky  which  hung  over 
Glastonbury  Abbey.  Weary  and  silent  were  the 
two  illustrious  friends  who  toiled  along,  making  on  foot 
the  last  miles  of  a  journey  which  stretched  from  Cam- 
bridge itself  to  Salisbury  Plain,  and  thence  to  the  ancient 
seat  of  St.  Dunstan.  They  had  tarried  for  three  days 
at  Stonehenge,  leaving  their  horses  and  attendant;  and 
they  proposed  to  return  to  the  interesting  ruins  as  soon 
as  this  long-expected  visit  to  the  famous  abbey  might 
be  concluded.  As  they  journeyed  along,  the  hitherto 
delicate  health  of  Erasmus  seemed  to  be  improving ; 
and  it  was  with  a  delightful  pride  that  Thomas  More, 
at  whose  house  he  had  remained  many  days,  beheld 
a  flush  of  growing  strength  upon  the  white  and  hollow 
cheeks  of  his  friend.  Long  as  had  been  the  way  from 
the  cottage  of  Caspar  Perrin  in  the  mountains  to  Cam- 


A  T  AN  ENGLISH  ABBE  Y.  55 

bridge,  the  fact  that  the  scholar  had  anticipated  lodging 
with  one  who  was  so  soon  to  take  his  place  among  the 
worthiest  sons  of  fame  as  Sir  Thomas  More,  quickened 
his  pace  and  made  the  route  delightful.  He  had  finished 
the  "  Praise  of  Folly  "  at  More's  house ;  and  the  result 
had  proved  how  exhaustive  upon  Erasmus  had  been 
even  the  fun  and  discussion  which,  evening  after  even- 
ing, its  fresh  pages  had  produced,, as  they  had  talked 
it  over  together. 

Erasmus  had  often  been  invited  to  Glastonbury  with 
any  friend  whom  he  might  desire  to  bring  with  him ; 
but  this  invitation  had  come  in  days  when  there  was  less 
interest  in  England  in  what  had  come  to  be  called  the 
"  influence  of  the  new  learning."  More  had  insisted 
upon  this  journey  as  a  holiday,  and  had  so  held  before 
his  scholarly  eye  the  prospect  of  seeing  -a  monument 
of  Druidical  worship  at  Stonehenge  on  their  way,  and 
a  recently  obtained  manuscript  of  the  Roman  age  at 
Glastonbury  Abbey,  as  to  effect  his  desire  with  his  guest. 
They  had  enjoyed  the  pilgrimage,  and  Erasmus  was 
certainly  stronger. 

Long  and  interesting  as  had  been  their  conversation 
concerning  Stonehenge,  the  Druids  and  the  Belgae,  and 
the  tradition  which  makes  the  ruin  which  they  had  left 
behind  a  relic  of  Ambrosius,  it  was  brief  and  spiritless 
enough  as  compared  to  that  which  they  held  when  the 
noble  walls  of  the  Western  Lady  Chapel  had,  after  a 
memorable  visit  with  the  Abbot  Richard  Beere,  faded 
from  their  eyes  and  taken  their  places  in  the  memory 
of  these  men. 

Abbot  Richard  had  long  been  anxious  to  entertain 
Erasmus,  whom  a  short  time  before  he  had  met  at  the 
court  of  Henry  VII. ;  and  strangely  enough,  when  the 
unexpected  guest  whom  Erasmus  had  brought  with  him 
at  the  entrance  of  the  guest-house  had  received  the  kiss 
of  peace  by  the  hospitaller  who  was  known  as  Brother 


56  MONK  AND    KNIGHT. 

Lysand,  the  eyes  of  the  intrepid  Thomas  More  recognized 
as  his  host  the  very  man  who  in  Parliament  had  watched 
him  so  intently,  when,  as  a  beardless  boy,  in  1504,  he  had 
thwarted  the  plans  of  the  king  for  a  heavy  subsidy.  The 
abbot  gracefully  acknowledged  his  joy  at  their  arrival, 
and  even  playfully  referred  to  the  first  meeting  of  Eras- 
mus and  the  already  eminent  young  statesman. 

"  I  was  present,"  said  he,  with  pardonable  pride,  "  at 
the  Lord  Mayor's  table  not  long  ago,  and  had  the  good 
fortune  to  start  the  argument  in  which  you  found  each 
other  out." 

"  How  was  that?  "  quickly  asked  Erasmus. 

"Well,"  said  the  abbot,  "your  own  soul  may  be 
absorbed  in  study,  to  the  joy  or  anxiety  of  all  England 
and  the  enlightenment  of  the  world,  but  you  must  not 
forget  that  occurrence.  You  remember  it,  I  am  sure." 

And  instantly  it  all  came  back  to  the  scholar,  —  the 
heat  of  that  debate,  the  silence  at  the  table,  the  evident 
concern  of  the  Lord  Mayor,  and  the  two  short  memo- 
rable sentences :  "  Aut  tu  es  Morus,  aut  nullus  !  "  cried 
out  Erasmus.  "  Aut  tu  es  Erasmus,  aut  diabolus  !  "  ex- 
claimed More. 

It  was  easy,  after  such  a  beginning,  for  the  conversation 
to  glide  along  pleasantly.  Behind  it  all,  however,  there 
was  a  distinct  reserve  upon  the  part  of  the  Abbot  of 
Glastonbury,  whenever  the  state  of  the  Church  or  the 
condition  of  English  scholarship  became  its  topic.  The 
learned  Richard  Beere,  powerful  and  yet  timid,  had  be- 
come a  conservative.  He  knew  that  Thomas  More  had 
been  rightly  accused  of  the  dreadful  sin  of  once  having 
been  devoted  to  the  life  of  a  monk,  and  of  having  fallen 
from  a  condition  of  ascetic  rapture.  He  also  remem- 
bered —  for  he  had  talked  it  over  with  no  less  a  person 
than  Thomas  Wolsey  at  London  —  that  Erasmus  was  the 
head  and  front  of  what  was  called  "  the  humanistic 
movement,"  and,  further,  that  it  was  conceived  to  be 


AT  AN-  ENGLISH  ABBE Y.  57 

the  influence  of  Erasmus,  who  was  ten  years  older  than 
More,  which  had  plunged  the  latter  so  deeply  into  what 
was  called  "  the  new  learning." 

Richard  Beere  had  once  been  very  friendly  with  Eras- 
mus, but  he  now  began  to  foresee  consequences,  flowing 
from  his  influence  upon  English  thought,  which  were 
certain  to  unseat  abbots  and  work  undesired  changes 
in  the  ecclesiastical  life  of  the  realm.  However,  he 
usually  regained  his  feet  in  threading  the  difficulties 
which  conversation  opened,  and  became  loquacious 
enough,  when  he  sought  to  illustrate  the  history  and 
grandeur  of  Glastonbury  Abbey  to  two  such  scholars. 
He  was  proud  of  the  sacred  pile,  and  he  was  so  wedded 
to  institutionalism  that  he  could  not  conceive  of  souls  so 
strong  in  themselves  as  not  to  lose  all  thought  of  the 
value  of  the  individual  beneath  a  revered  shadow. 

"  Possibly,"  said  he  to  his  friendly  adviser,  Brother 
Lysand,  "  these  very  heretics,  if  such  they  really  be,  may 
be  drawn  back  to  love,  as  never  before,  the  warm 
breasts  of  .the  Holy  Mother." 

Abbot  Richard  had  given  instructions  that  the  dinner 
should  be  delayed  until  the  expected  guest  might  arrive ; 
and  now  the  great  refectory,  which  had  so  often  been 
crowded  with  as  many  as  five  hundred  guests,  —  a  hall 
whose  entertainment  and  board  had  been  so  often  abused 
by  the  representatives  of  decayed  titles  with  their  mul- 
titudinous retinues,  —  opened  its  spacious  doors  with 
welcome  to  these  two  visitors.  The  two  flights  of  stairs 
soon  became  two  avenues  filled  with  monks  issuing  from 
the  cloisters ;  and  as  they  entered  the  lavatory  to  per- 
form their  ablutions,  Erasmus  turned  to  More  and  said 
in  a  low  voice,  — 

"  Think  of  the  number  of  men  and  of  the  amount 
of  masculine  energy  of  which  monasticism  has  robbed 
the  world." 

"  Probably  they  would  have  amounted  to  but  little  if 


58  MONK  AND  KNIGHT. 

they  had  been  out  of  this  solemn  prison,"  answered 
More. 

"  Their  life  is  worthless  now,  certainly.  The  world 
would  be  poorer  with  them,  if  they  were  let  in  upon  it, 
now  that  monkish  mortification  has  extracted  their  man- 
hood. But  it  has  been  a  crime  to  withdraw  from  the 
world's  work  these  vast  armies  of  well-bred,  healthful, 
and  oftentimes  devoted  young  men,  who,  since  the  days 
of  Saint  Anthony,  have  filled  these  monasteries  and 
abbeys,  and  who  have  been  rendered  ignorant,  super- 
stitious, and  immoral." 

More  was  surprised  to  hear  his  friend  —  who,  though 
often  anticipating  great  changes  in  the  Church,  had  al- 
ways favored  peace  at  any  price  —  speak  so  strongly ; 
and  he  was  about  to  tell  him  as  much,  when  the  sub- 
prior  rang  the  bell.  The  abbot  drew  them  to  a  table  at 
the  upper  end  of  the  room ;  and  they  were  seated,  one 
on  his  right,  the  other  on  his  left,  near  the  priors  and 
the  other  heads  of  the  abbey. 

Scarcely  had  the  bell  been  rung,  when  the  monks 
appeared,  each  bowing  to  the  high  table.  More  thought, 
with  displeasure,  that  he  had  once  been  devoted  to  such 
useless  genuflections.  Erasmus  remembered  his  own 
effort  to  drown  the  scholar  within  his  own  breast  in 
a  monastery  near  Delft. 

The  sub-prior  gave  bidding ;  seats  were  taken.  Wearily 
did  they  sing  the  words  of  a  psalm  which  in  the  real 
world  would  have  sung  itself  into  an  anthem.  With 
tiresome  mechanism  the  brief  service  was  performed, 
and  the  benediction  was  over.  In  a  sepulchral  voice,  an 
asthmatic  old  monk,  who  now  and  then  looked  away  over 
toward  the  guests  at  the  risk  of  losing  his  place,  began 
to  read  in  Latin  a  portion  of  the  New  Testament,  which 
portion  proved  to  be  of  sufficient  length  to  last  during  the 
entire  meal.  The  soup  had  been  uncovered ;  the  cellarer 
was  bowed  in  and  out,  and  the  dinner  proceeded. 


AT  AN  ENGLISH  ABBEY.  59 

"  Who,  I  pray  you,"  said  More,  "  who  is  this  bright  boy 
who  seems  to  have  the  freedom  of  the  whole  abbey?  " 

"And  never  seems  to  abuse  it,"  added  Erasmus. 

"Ah  !"  replied  the  abbot,  as  he  smiled  on  him  and 
gave  recognition  by  a  single  nod  of  the  head  to  one  of 
the  tables  of  the  priests,  near  which  the  boy  chanced  to 
be  standing,  "  that  child  may  at  some  time  be  Abbot 
of  Glastonbury."  The  abbot's  eyes  showed  the  pas- 
sionate fondness  of  a  father  as  he  spoke.  "He  is 
born  to  do  great  things  in  the  Holy  Church.  He  is 
a  grateful  child,  and  some  day  he  will  know  that  the 
Church  has  saved  him  from  an  abominable  life  and 
damnation." 

"  Was  he  some  bad  little  whelp  whom  you  picked  up 
in  his  villany?"  asked  Erasmus,  with  that  quiet  scorn 
and  biting  sarcasm  which  had  not  entirely  exhausted 
itself  in  writing  the  "  Praise  of  Folly." 

"  Oh,  no  !  "  answered  the  abbot,  who  shrugged  his 
shoulders  ;  "  instead  of  that,  he  has  been  the  purest  and 
most  truthful  of  children ;  and  I  sometimes  feel  that  he 
cannot  —  " 

"You  do  not  mean,"  said  the  too  quick  and  keen 
Erasmus,  "  that  he  cannot  remain  pure  and  truthful  here 
in  this  holy  atmosphere?  " 

The  abbot  did  not  feel  the  sword-thrust  which  Eras- 
mus sent  into  the  word  "holy;  "  but  one  of  the  priests 
at  the  table  nudged  his  neighbor,  while  the  abbot  said, 
"  Quite  the  contrary ;  it  was  to  keep  him  innocent  and 
good  that  he  was  sent  hither." 

"  To  escape,  as  you  were  about  to  say,  a  severe  dam- 
nation?" cruelly  pursued  Erasmus. 

The  Abbot  of  Glastonbury  was  a  trifle  worried ;  but  he 
thought  the  whole  story  might  enable  him  to  extricate 
himself  from  toils  which  he  could  see  were  a  delight  to 
the  sly  and  witty  scholar.  The  child  had  moved  nearer 
to  their  table,  and  he  was  very  beautiful. 


60  MONK  AND  KNIGHT. 

"  The  truth  is,"  said  Abbot  Richard,  with  that  assert- 
iveness  with  which  special  and  desperate  pleading  always 
begins,  —  "  the  truth  is,  this  child  —  is  he  not  a  beautiful 
boy?  —  was  sent  hither  by  the  holy  friar  Noglas,  of 
Lutterworth.  His  father  died  only  last  year ;  and  the 
child's  mother,  who  was  an  angel  of  mercy  and  a  lover 
of  the  Holy  Church,  survived  her  husband  but  a  month. 
I  wish  I  could  think  well  of  the  boy's  father."  The 
abbot  shook  his  head  with  every  additional  expression  of 
sadness.  "  He  is  in  the  hands  of  the  Infinite  Mercy ;  and 
his  whole  fortune  was  divided,  in  order  that  incessant 
prayers  might  ascend  for  his  salvation.  The  remnant  of 
his  fortune  fell  into  the  hands  of  his  brother,  who  by  a 
testament  has  been  enjoined  to  guard  it  and  to  purchase 
the  books  —  O  vanitas  vanitatum  !  —  books  which 
William  Caxton  has  already  printed,  and  —  the  pity  is 
deeper  when  I  think  of  it  —  the  books  also  which  a  cer- 
tain Aldus  in  Venice  shall  print.  The  whole  remnant  of 
the  fortune  may  be  wasted  in  this  evil  way.  These  books 
and  some  worn  manuscripts,  which  we  have  good  cause 
to  suspect  are  vile  and  pernicious,  are  to  be  given  to  the 
boy  —  Vian  is  his  name  !  —  when  he  comes  to  later 
years.  The  boy's  surroundings  were  bad  enough  so  long 
as  his  father  lived.  The  holy  friar  Noglas  wrote  us  that 
his  father  actually  met,  at  hours  which  must  lead  to  sus- 
picion, with  those  detestable  and  godless  Lollards  of 
Lutterworth,  who,  since  the  days  of  the  arch-heretic 
John  Wycliffe,  have  beset  Lutterworth  with  ill.  To  save 
the  child,  his  mother  desired  him  to  be  sent  hither.  He 
is  our  child  ;  and  the  saints  forefend  us  against  misleading 
such  an  one." 

As  the  abbot  spoke,  More  remembered  a  home  which 
he  and  Erasmus  had  just  left,  the  beauty  of  which  history 
has  not  allowed  to  be  forgotten ;  and  as  the  monks  who 
sat  near  were  silent,  he  thought  of  the  streams  of  father- 
hood which  had  been  imprisoned  within  the  walls  of  such 


AT  AN  ENGLISH  ABBEY.  6 1 

institutions,  and  that,  after  all,  it  was  not  strange  that, 
sacred  as  they  were,  they  bred  immoralities  and  'abuses 
without  number. 

As  they  passed  by  the  seven  long  tables  at  which  stood 
the  priests  and  lay-brethren,  each  the  easy  master  of  im- 
pressive etiquette,  the  "  Miserere  "  was  sung ;  and  Vian 
came  close  to  the  abbot,  who  gently  stroked  his  forehead 
and  took  his  hand. 

In  the  morning  Erasmus  saw  the  boy  in  the  abbot's 
apartments,  and  was  amused  to  find  him  employing  him- 
self in  rubbing  a  piece  of  parchment  smooth  with  chalk 
and  pumice-stone,  —  articles  which  the  youth  speedily 
concealed  when  Abbot  Richard  entered.  The  reason  of 
this  instant  concealment  was  apparent  to  Erasmus  when 
the  abbot  had  sent  the  boy  on  an  unimportant  errand  to 
the  sacristy,  and  when  he  proceeded  to  say,  — 

"  The  chalk  on  the  youth's  frock  gives  me  pain." 

"The  child  will  probably  be  a  scholar,"  said  Erasmus, 
dryly. 

"  I  fear  that  he  will  be  misguided  by  those  who  have 
age  and  have  not  sufficient  faith." 

"  Age,"  said  the  scholar,  "  is  not  likely  to  destroy  actual 
faith ;  it  does  often  dissolve  dreams,  however." 

"  Alas  !  men  oftener  lose  their  souls  with  losing  their 
dreams,"  replied  the  abbot.  "  We  are  losing  too  much 
and  too  rapidly.  The  Holy  Church  is  pursued  by  ene- 
mies who  ought  to  be  friends.  In  the  race  she  is  flinging 
aside  precious  garments,  and  will  soon  be  unclothed.  If 
I  had  my  way  at  Rome,  she  would  stop  her  flight,  and 
even  with  the  points  of  swords,  turn  her  pursuers  back. 
I  do  not  like  to  have  Vian  copy  the  manuscripts  of 
wicked  and  pagan  Rome.  The  chalk  on  his  frock  shows 
that  he  is  under  evil  influences." 

"  I  cannot  imagine  evil  influences  in  such  a  holy  place 
as  this  abbey,"  said  Erasmus,  with  painful  irony. 

"  Ah  !  "  replied  the  abbot,  "  I  am  beset  with  doubting 


62  MONK  AND  KNIGHT. 

monks  and  many  cares,  but  the  severest  of  all  is  my  care 
that  my  monks  shall  be  kept  from  sinful  familiarities  with 
what  is  called  ( the  new  learning.'  Vian  shall  be  shielded 
from  the  wickedness  of  unbelief." 

The  truth  is  that  Vian  had  already  copied,  with  an 
artistic  elegance  quite  marvellous  in  a  boy,  a  manu- 
script of  Lucian,  which  had  been  brought  secretly  from 
Italy  by  the  old  monk  Fra  Giovanni,  whose  reading  of  the 
Scriptures  at  the  dinner  was  so  interrupted  by  asthma  and 
his  inclination  to  observe  the  guests.  One  of  the  monks, 
into  whose  care  Vian  had  been  committed  by  the  abbot, 
had  an  interest  in  this  Latin  author  of  which  the  abbot 
had  no  suspicion ;  and  the  boy  had  been  allowed  to 
amuse  himself  and  obtain  favors  from  his  friend,  by  work- 
ing in  an  aimless  but  interested  way,  as  Abbot  Richard 
Beere  supposed,  but  really  in  a  way  most  perilous  to  the 
abbot's  plans,  at  pens,  knives,  parchment,  inks,  chalk, 
pumice-stone,  and,  most  significant  of  all,  this  manu- 
script of  Lucian's  "  Mycillus." 

"He  has  copied  a  dialogue  from  Lucian,"  said  the 
abbot,  with  evident  displeasure. 

The  remark  struck  Erasmus  with  force,  as  he  saw  that 
the  abbot  knew  that  Erasmus  himself,  nearly  nine  years 
before,  had  translated  some  of  Lucian's  severest  stric- 
tures on  the  philosophers  of  his  day,  and  that  the  "  Praise 
of  Folly,"  which  certainly  the  abbot  had  not  seen,  and 
which  he  certainly  would  read  with  pain,  had  already  im- 
pressed his  friend  Thomas  More  as  a  satire  conceived 
against  the  monks,  and  owing  much  of  its  point  to  the 
author's  acquaintance  with  the  earlier  master  of  ridicule 
at  Samosota,  Lucian.  Erasmus  already  anticipated  the 
judgment  of  subsequent  literary  criticism ;  he  was  to  be 
called  the  Lucian  of  the  sixteenth  century. 

"  Why,  Lucian  ?  "  said  he  to  the  intent  abbot.  "  Lucian 
is  sure  to  sharpen  his  wits.  Your  Reverence  cannot  be 
uninterested  in  his  satire.  You  have  in  his  dialogue  a 


AT  AN  ENGLISH  ABBEY.  63 

cock  talking  with  a  cobbler,  his  master,  more  ludicrously 
than  any  professional  jester,  and  yet  more  wisely  than  the 
vulgar  herd  of  divines  and  philosophers  in  their  schools, 
who,  with  a  noble  disdain  of  more  important  matters, 
dispute  about  pompous  nothings." 

"  But  this  is  no  time  for  jests,  though  they  be  clever. 
The  habit  of  jesting  about  the  Holy  Church  will  grow 
out  of  Vian's  copying  Lucian's  dialogue.  He  is  a  young 
master  of  Latin.  He  really  enjoys  his  reading ;  I  over- 
heard him  laugh  as  he  wrote.  He  was  copying  that 
passage  which  shows  the  panic  in  the  Pantheon,  when 
the  Olympian  deities  find  out  that  men  no  longer  have 
faith  in  them.  It  must  have  been  that  he  laughed  at 
what  he  had  just  read.  I  think  it  was  his  feeling  of  how 
ludicrously  they  behaved  when  they  thought  that,  as  gods, 
they  would  live  no  longer,  that  amused  him.  I  feel  that 
he  may  get  a  habit  of  amusing  himself  with  sacred  things. 
Some  wickedly  affect  to  believe  that  the  Holy  Church 
has  some  practices  and  certain  beliefs  which  are,  as  you 
say,  '  pompous  nothings.'  The  saints  preserve  Vian  from 
falling  into  the  habit  of  jesting  with  things  as  ancient 
and  holy  as  are  the  papacy,  the  confessional,  and  the 
priesthood  !  " 

Erasmus  detected  a  certain  pathos  in  this  position.  He 
knew  full  well  that  many  revered  institutions  could  not 
endure  jesting.  Even  the  attitude  of  Richard  Beere  had 
been  partially  transformed,  as  he  had  contemplated  the 
possibilities  in  the  immediate  future.  He  appreciated 
the  solemn  faithfulness  which  this  timid  conservative 
showed.  He  himself  had  begun  to  quail  a  little  at  the 
possible  results  of  ridiculing  the  clergy  and  their  igno- 
rant impiety.  But  the  "  Praise  of  Folly  "  was  written  ; 
and  such  men  as  Abbot  Richard  must  now  hold  the  reins 
over  the  horses  which  the  noise  would  frighten.  Vian 
and  such  bright  boys  surely  would  get  hold  of  it  in  the 
abbeys ;  and  he  felt  concerned  a  little  oftentimes,  as  he 


64  MONK  AND  KNIGHT. 

thought  that  as  surely  as  this  boy  had  laughed  at  the 
old  philosophy  of  Rome  as  he  read  the  pages  of  Lucian, 
such  as  he  would  not  only  laugh,  but  grow  sceptical  about 
the  Romish  Church  as  they  read  the  "  Praise  of  Folly." 
He  pitied  the  shy  and  painful  conservatism  of  this  abbot, 
and  he  resolved  that  if  he  obtained  an  opportunity  — 
which,  by  the  way,  never  came  —  he  would  caution  Vian 
against  supposing  that  anything  else  in  the  world  was 
really  as  worthy  of  being  made  fun  of  as  was  the  old 
philosophy.  One  thing  he  would  be  careful  about,  —  he 
would  not  annoy  his  host  with  his  own  doubts  about  the 
Church,  his  own  knowledge  of  her  weakness  and  crimes, 
and  his  own  sure  hope  that  when  Abbot  Richard  had 
been  dead  a  long  while,  Vian  and  others  like  him  would 
be  led  in  the  triumph  of  "  the  new  learning." 

All  the  resolutions  of  Erasmus  had  those  alarming 
defects  which  come  from  a  weak  will  and  a  lively 
intelligence. 


CHAPTER   V. 

UNPLEASANT   VISITORS. 

No  man  e'er  felt  the  halter  draw 
With  good  opinion  of  the  law. 

TRUMBULL. 

MORE  came  into  the  vaulted  room  just  as  the 
abbot  and  Erasmus  had  partaken  of  the  excellent 
beer  which  was  brewed  by  the  monks  of  Glastonbury. 
After  sipping  a  little  more,  and  remarking  upon  its  good 
quality,  they  started,  with  the  proud  head  of  the  institu- 
tion, to  look  at  the  interesting  and  sacred  relics.  Old  Fra 
Giovanni,  breathing  whispers  to  Vian,  who  came  close  to 
Abbot  Richard,  came  and  went  with  surprising  freedom, 
as  they  proceeded  from  spot  to  spot.  This  beautiful 
youth  amidst  these  ancient  buildings,  this  fresh  boyhood 
in  this  atmosphere  of  antiquity,  —  the  contrasts  and  the 
suggestions  made  the  scholar  and  the  statesman  silent. 
Abbot  Richard,  however,  talked  incessantly. 

"  For  fifteen  centuries  and  more,  the  cross  has  stood 
on  this  spot ;  and  yet  some  fear  that  base  men  will  some 
day  be  wicked  enough  to  raze  these  buildings  to  the 
earth.  The  saints  forefend  us  !  " 

He  listened  for  a  reply,  but  Erasmus  said  only  this  : 
"  There  will  be  no  change  but  for  the  better,  I  am 
sure." 

VOL.  i.  —  5 


66  MONK  AND  KATIGHT. 

"Ah,  if  I  could  be  sure  !  "  urged  the  abbot.  "  Here- 
tics are  everywhere,  and  kings  are  silent.  Would  that 
the  sword  were  drawn  but  once  !  they  would  disappear." 

"Nay,"  said  More;  "ideas  alone  may  conquer 
ideas.  Saint  Peter  once  drew  his  sword ;  and  his  Mas- 
ter bade  him  sheath  it  again." 

"  Yes,  good  friend  !  "  added  Erasmus  ;  "  ideas  cannot 
be  swept  back  by  institutions,  —  for  institutions  are  only 
the  forms  of  old  ideas." 

He  was  just  going  to  say  that  new  ideas  often  sup- 
planted them  with  new  institutions,  when  the  abbot, 
somewhat  nettled,  said,  "And  what  if  these  old  ideas 
be  true  ideas?" 

"  Then,"  cautiously  replied  Erasmus,  —  "  then  they 
need  no  swords ;  they  and  their  institutions  will  stand 
forever." 

"  Ah  !  "  said  the  abbot,  "  the  Holy  Church  is  an  insti- 
tution of  God,  not  the  embodiment  of  any  human 
ideas." 

Thomas  More  remembered  the  story  of  the  young 
Christ  as  the  "  Son  of  Man  "  standing  in  the  temple  and 
saying,  while  Sabbath  and  temple  were  being  trans- 
formed, "  A  greater  than  the  temple  is  here." 

Erasmus  said  meditatively,  in  Vian's  hearing,  "  Even 
the  Sabbath  was  made  for  man,  and  not  man  for  the 
Sabbath," — and  he  wanted  to  say  that  man  was  God's 
child,  and  dearer  to  Him  than  all  else ;  but  they  were 
nearing  Glastonbury  Thorn. 

The  abbot  was  eloquent ;  and  Vian  wondered  at  what 
was  sure  to  be  plain  to  him  at  a  later  day,  —  what  could 
Master  Erasmus  have  meant  by  that  quotation  about  the 
Sabbath  which  the  boy  had  already  seen  in  the  Vulgate? 

"  This  is  but  an  ordinary  bush  to  profane  eyes,"  said 
Abbot  Richard,  as  if  he  would  prevent  any  outburst  of 
rationalism  and  irreverence  on  the  part  of  Erasmus, 
whose  words,  especially  when  spoken  in  Vian's  presence, 


UNPLEASANT  VISITORS.  6/ 

he  dreaded;  "but  it  is  something  else  to  the  eye  of 
history  and  to  the  heart  of  faith." 

"  Sometimes,  your  Reverence,  the  over-zealous  heart 
of  faith  makes  the  eye  of  history  very  near-sighted," 
remarked  the  unimpressible  scholar. 

It  was  a  thrust  which  the  abbot  was  glad  Vian  did  not 
notice ;  but  it  nearly  staggered  the  credulous  and  loqua- 
cious Churchman. 

"  Have  I  invited  these  heretics  to  my  abbey,  that  this 
promising  child  may  be  ruined?"  thought  the  pious 
Abbot  Richard. 

Erasmus  was  sorry  he  had  said  so  much;  but  his 
scholarly  spirit  was  full  of  rebukes  which  he  did  not 
utter  against  the  ignorance  intrenched  even  in  this 
abbey. 

He  had  been  annoyed  at  Giovanni's  reading  at  dinner, 
as  he  reiterated  some  of  the  most  palpable  errors  of  the 
Vulgate.  The  erudite  visitor  was  at  that  time  at  work  on 
the  critical  edition  of  the  Greek  Testament,  which  was 
to  appear  in  1516.  This  audacious  impiety  the  abbot 
had  already  set  down  against  Erasmus.  He  had  however 
failed  to  change  the  attitude  of  the  scholar  by  hospitality. 
Even  in  the  presence  of  Glastonbury  Thorn  he  replied  to 
the  hot  questions  of  the  abbot,  —  "  Would  you  presume  to 
correct  the  Holy  Ghost?  Are  you  the  enemy  of  the 
Church?" 

Erasmus  simply  said,  as  often  he  was  accustomed  to 
say  :  "  Can  there  possibly  be  any  worse  enemies  of  the 
Church  than  the  godless  pontiffs  who  silently  suffer  Jesus 
Christ  to  be  rejected,  —  binding  him  by  their  mercenary 
adherents,  traducing  him  by  forced  interpretations,  and 
strangling  him  by  their  pestilent  morals." 

"  I,  in  spite  of  your  contumacious  words,  am  the  adhe- 
rent of  his  Holiness,"  spoke  the  abbot,  with  a  flashing 
eye. 

Vian  came  close  to  the  revered  head  of  Glastonbury, 


68  MONK  AND  KNIGHT. 

and  trembled.  The  boy  felt  that  something  which  his 
Reverence  prized  highly  was  endangered. 

"  And  every  lover  of  truth,  my  gracious  host,  is  an 
adherent  of  Him  who  is  the  truth,"  trenchantly  added 
Erasmus. ' 

The  Abbot  Richard  was  silent  for  an  instant,  as  though 
puzzled  with  this  audacious  phenomenon,  —  a  man  of 
the  Renaissance  aglow  with  fire  for  a  reformation.  Then 
he  asked,  as  he  sent  Vian  away,  — 

"What  would  you  do  with  your  Greek  Testament?  " 

"  I  desire,"  gladly  answered  Erasmus,  —  "I  desire  to 
lead  back  to  its  first  teachings  the  cold  wordy  thing 
called  '  theology.'  Would  that  this  labor  might  bear  as 
much  fruit,  for  Christianity  as  it  has  cost  in  effort  and 
application  !  " 

The  conservative  Churchman  shrugged  his  shoulders 
once  more,  and  began  again  to  talk  about  the  relics  of 
Glastonbury.  They  were  now  standing  near  the  thorn. 

"  Do  wicked  men  doubt  the  miracles  of  the  Holy 
Church?  Here  is  a  living  miracle." 

"  And  this,"  said  Erasmus,  as  he  touched  its  green 
leaves,  — "  this  is  the  withered  staff  of  Saint  Joseph  of  Ari- 
mathea,  in  whose  grave  lay  the  dead  Christ  ?  Do  you  not 
think  that  the  devotions  paid  to  the  slips  from  this  tree, 
which  slips  I  have  seen  in  other  lands,  healing  the  sick 
and  filling  the  pockets  of  the  priests  with  coin,  do  en- 
tomb the  Lord  again,  so  that  the  Holy  Church  has  even 
now  a  Christ  in  the  sepulchre?  " 

Vian,  who  had  joined  them  again,  looked  up  with  the 
wondering  eyes  of  a  thoughtful  boy ;  and  Abbot  Richard, 
affecting  to  be  ignorant  that  the  scholar  had  asked  a 
pointed  question,  told  the  story,  presumably  for  the  in- 
struction of  the  boy. 

It  was  this.  Joseph  of  Arimathea  was  wealthy,  and  a 
member  of  the  Sanhedrim.  At  the  death  of  Jesus  his 
proffered  tomb  was  the  testimony  to  his  ardent  disciple- 


UNPLEASANT  VISITORS.  69 

ship.  Of  course  he  was  banished.  Adrift  for  long 
months  in  a  boat  without  sails  or  oar,  he  landed  at  last, 
with  Philip,  Lazarus,  Martha,  and  Mary,  at  Marseilles. 
Joseph  became  missionary  to  Britain ;  and,  tossed  shore- 
ward in  Bridgewater  Bay,  he  and  his  cause  became  pos- 
sessed of  twelve  hides  of  land,  by  the  tolerant  generosity 
of  King  Arviragus. 

"Up  this  very  hill,"  said  the  abbot,  "  did^he  climb, 
from  the  morasses  and  fogs  below.  With  tired  feet,  on 
this  spot  he  ended  his  journey.  It  was  Christmas  Day. 
'We  are  weary  all,'  he  cried  out;  and  he  struck  his 
staff  into  the  earth,  and  fell  to  praying  and  thanking 
God." 

"  So,"  said  More  ;  "  it  is  called  '  Weary-all  Hill.'  " 

"And  so,"  said  the  abbot,  grateful  that  More  was  at 
least  modest  in  his  scepticism,  —  "  and  so  the  wild  men 
who  crowded  about  the  saint  were  quite  powerless  to  do 
him  harm,  as  were  the  lions ,  over  Daniel.  From  that 
hour,  every  Christmas  Day,  this  staff  of  the  holy  Saint 
Joseph  has  given  forth  its  verdure  and  its  blossoms,  per- 
fuming the  airs  which  reach  the  abbey." 

"  Was  the  staff  of  Joseph  a  shoot  from  the  tree  out 
of  which  the  true  cross  was  made?"  asked  the  author 
of  the  "  Praise  of  Folly,"  with  an  irritating  innocence  of 
manner. 

"  Ah  !  "  said  Abbot  Richard,  entirely  satisfied  with  the 
rising  faith  of  Erasmus ;  "  we  know  not.  The  walnut- 
tree  yonder  is  covered  with  leaves  on  each  Saint  Bar- 
nabas' Day." 

"  Both  of  these  trees  must  produce  a  fine  revenue  for 
Christ's  poor  priests ;  for  they  sell  the  slips  of  the  thorn 
at  wicked  prices  elsewhere.  And  I  am  told  by  our  good 
friend  here  that  crowds  come  to  create  a  carnival  when 
the  walnut-tree  puts  forth  its  leaves." 

To  this  suggestion  of  the  money-making  tendencies 
of  the  monks,  the  abbot  made  no  reply.  He  could  not 


7O  MONK  AND  KNIGHT. 

enjoy  his  visitor ;  he  was  discouraged,  and  spoke  less  to 
the  scholar  and  more  to  his  friend  More.  Silently  they 
walked  back  to  the  chapel. 

The  twisted  withes,  of  which  John  of  Glastonbury  has 
spoken,  had  long  ago  given  place  to  something  more 
elegant  and  substantial;  but  they  were  living  and  fra- 
grant in  the  conversation  of  the  abbot,  as  he  spoke  of 
the  chapel  and  the  arches. 

Never  quite  willing  to  confront  all  the  results  of  the 
influence  of  "the  new  learning,"  More  was  interested  to 
hear  this  loyal  Churchman  and  Englishman,  as  he  antici- 
pated the  architectural  writers  of  later  periods,  insist- 
ing, as  he  did,  that  the  Gothic  order  of  architecture 
was  not  an  importation  from  France  or  Italy,  but 
that  it  owed  its  origin  in  England  to  the  imitation 
of  the  wicker-work  of  which  the  Chapel  of  St.  Michael, 
connected  with  the  Glastonbury  Abbey  of  the  past,  was 
constructed. 

"  Interlacing  willows,  which  first  wound  around  the 
posts,  were  the  earliest  suggestions  of  the  intersecting 
lines  of  groined  roofs,"  said  his  Reverence. 

"  So  easily,"  said  Erasmus,  "  do  institutions  grow  with 
the  growing  life  of  mankind,  that  there  always  seems 
some  fact  handy  to  our  minds  over  which,  as  over  a 
bridge,  the  ambitious  thought  may  go  to  some  greater 
fact.  I  wonder  if  we  are  not  now,  in  Europe,  about  to 
leave  for  a  while  the  making  of  chapels  and  cathedrals, 
for  the  founding  of  schools  like  Master  John  Colet's  in 
London?" 

The  very  name  of  John  Colet  of  St.  Paul's  roused  the 
already  excited  abbot  to  eloquent  ire.  He  had  known 
him  as  a  "humanist ; "  and  much  as  at  times  he  had  sym- 
pathized with  learning,  to  be  a  devotee  of  his  peculiar 
ideas  was  worse  for  Colet,  in  the  judgment  of  Richard 
Beere,  than  if  he  had  been  a  scoundrel.  The  abbot 
now  looked  upon  John  Colet's  visit  to  Italy,  years  before, 


UNPLEASANT  VISITORS.  7 1 

as  an  event  of  sad  import  to  the  orthodoxy  of  English 
Christendom. 

Certainly  the  great  Oxford  scholar  had  come  back 
with  a  love  for  the  Christian  element  in  Neo-Platonism 
which  made  him  very  tolerant  toward  Florentine  efforts 
at  philosophy,  and  with  a  holy  anger  against  ecclesiastical 
vice  which  made  him  intolerant  toward  much  that  was 
essential  in  the  mind  of  Richard  Beere.  Colet  had 
not  yet  founded  St.  Paul's  School;  but  Erasmus  knew 
that  the  abbot  understood  his  plans,  and  that  this 
school  was  the  most  hopeful  prophecy  in  the  brain  of 
an  Englishman. 

"  That  unhappy  day  when  John  Colet  brought  heresy 
into  England,  has  shadowed  the  Church  and  throne," 
said  the  abbot.  "  May  the  saints  save  such  as  these  "  — 
placing  his  hand  upon  the  head  of  Vian  —  "  from  his 
baneful  influence  !  He  has  perverted  the  Scriptures  ;  he 
has  assailed  the  Church." 

"If  the  Church  is  on  the  rock,  even  hell  may  not  shake 
her,"  said  More. 

"  If  she  is  not  upon  the  rock,"  added  Erasmus,  "  the 
truth  uttered  by  wise  and  brave  men  may  compel  her  to 
find  the  rock." 

It  was  two  against  one,  and  the  abbot  was  becoming 
furious.  "  Come  with  me  !  Come  with  me  !  "  he  cried. 

In  his  haste  and  petulance,  he  had  forgotten  to  send 
Vian  upon  another  errand.  The  boy  clung  to  More,  half 
afraid  of  the  abbot. 

They  entered  the  Lord  Abbot  Richard's  dwelling. 
Erasmus  sat  behind  a  mullioned  window,  overhung  with 
fine  tracery  in  stone.  He  was  perfectly  serene.  The 
abbot  read  aloud  :  "  If  he  be  a  lawful  bishop,  he  of 
himself  does  nothing,  but  God  in  him.  But  if  he  do 
attempt  anything  of  himself,  he  is  then  a  breeder  of 
poison.  And  if  he  also  bring  this  to  birth,  and  carry 
into  execution  his  own  will,  he  is  wickedly  distilling 


72  MONK  AND  KNIGHT. 

poison  to  the  destruction  of  the  Church.  This  has  now, 
indeed,  been  done  for  many  years  past,  and  has  by  this 
time  so  increased  as  to  take  powerful  hold  on  all  mem- 
bers of  the  Church ;  so  that  unless  that  Mediator,  who 
alone  can  do  so,  who  created  and  founded  the  Church 
out  of  nothing  for  himself,  —  therefore  does  Saint  Paul 
often  call  it  a  '  creature,'  —  unless,  I  say,  the  Mediator 
Jesus  lay  to  his  hand  with  all  speed,  our  most  disordered 
Church  cannot  be  far  from  death.  .  .  .  Men  consult  not 
God  on  what  is  to  be  done  by  constant  prayer,  but  take 
counsel  with  men,  whereby  they  shake  and  overthrow 
everything.  All  —  as  we  must  own  with  grief,  and  as  I 
write  with  both  grief  and  tears  —  seek  their  own,  not  the 
things  which  are  Jesus  Christ's ;  not  heavenly  things,  but 
earthly;  what  will  bring  them  to  death,  not  what  will 
bring  them  to  life  eternal." 

"Who  spoke  so  truly  and  so  well?"  inquired  the 
scholar,  who  was  certain  that  he  detected  in  those 
words  the  soul  and  manner  of  John  Colet. 

"The  wicked  heretic  whose  name  you  have  brought 
to  this  place,"  sharply  answered  Abbot  Richard. 

"On  my  soul,"  said  the  serene  More,  "you  would  love 
John  Colet,  did  you  but  know  him  as  I  do." 

"  I  cannot  love,  and  I  will  not  know,  the  enemies  of 
the  Church.  You  heard  the  words  which  I  read.  Such 
words  against  her  Supreme  Head  are  worthy  of  death. 
Oh,  these  are  days  of  peril  !  " 

In  vain  did  More  attempt  to  reconcile  the  troubled 
and  dogmatic  abbot  to  the  fine  and  noble  character 
of  a  man  whom  More  loved  so  well  and  honored  so 
thoroughly.  In  Colet  was  the  Renaissance  as  it  began 
to  blossom  into  the  Reformation ;  and  Abbot  Richard 
was  against  "the  new  learning"  the  moment  it  looked 
toward  disturbing  the  Church.  In  Colet  was  the  quiet 
power  of  the  Reformation,  which  was  sure  to  be  unquiet 
elsewhere;  and  the  head  of  Glastonbury  Abbey  would 


UNPLEASANT  VISITORS.  73 

meet  it  with  a  sword.  The  kings  who  courted  either 
"  the  new  learning ' '  or  the  reform  were  untrustworthy ; 
the  priests  who  recognized  either,  he  would  expel  from  the 
abbey  ! 

Yet  he  knew  that  this  latter  course  was  not  prudent, 
even  if  it  were  possible.  He  had  often  stood  in  solitude 
by  Glastonbury  Thorn,  and  wondered  what  to  do.  No 
poet  has  estimated  his  difficulties. 

"  The  miracle  we  now  behold, 

Fresh  from  our  Master's  hand, 
From  age  to  age  shall  long  be  told 

In  every  Christian  land, 
And  kings  and  nations  yet  unborn 
Shall  bless  the  Glastonbury  thorn." 

That  was  a  mere  statement  of  a  rhymester.  He  felt  the 
beauty  of  such  a  hope,  and  the  difficulty  of  its  realization, 
ages  before  the  poet's  birth. 

No  one  of  her  abbots  had  added  lands,  or  builded  so 
largely  upon  and  with  the  past,  as  had  he. 

"  Still  farm  to  farm,  and  park  to  park, 

They  added  year  by  year. 
From  hills  that  heard  the  soaring  lark, 

To  lowly  marsh  and  mere  ; 
But  still  they  cried,  «  The  space  is  small 

For  an  Abbot  of  Glastonbury  Hall.'  " 

He  felt  that  all  that  had  been  created  there  to  the 
honor  of  religion  was  permanent.  In  the  hour  when 
doubt  besieged  the  castle,  he  would  add  to  its  strength 
and  glory.  Here,  where  they  who  first  brought  the  gospel 
to  Britain  had  solemnly  woven  twigs  and  prayed  beneath 
a  thatched  roof,  Richard  Beere  saw  at  last  sixty  acres 
covered  with  noble  buildings.  As  often  as  he  felt  the 
breath  of  the  Renaissance  or  heard  the  thunder  of  the 
Reformation,  had  he  gone  to  Parliament  House  as 
the  proudest  of  spiritual  barons,  or  seated  himself  within 
his  elegant  court,  where  the  sons  of  royalty  and  nobility 


74  MONK  AND  KNIGHT, 

bowed  before  him  ;  or  perhaps  he  gathered  about  him  a 
hundred  men  of  noble  birth,  mounted  on  mettled  steeds 
and  clad  in  luxurious  garments,  making  up  his  retinue, 
as  he  set  out  for  a  synod ;  or  perhaps  he  then  conceived 
or  executed  a  plan  for  some  such  elaborate  addition  to 
the  buildings  as  should  demonstrate  the  unshaken  con- 
fidence which  her  most  conspicuous  English  abbot  pos- 
sessed in  the  character  of  the  present  ecclesiastical 
machinery.  He  knew  not  that  colossal  edifices,  dog- 
matic utterances,  and  persecuting  ardor  are  the  infal- 
lible signs  which  ideas  make  of  their  evanescence. 

He  was  proud  to  stand  with  the  builders  of  these 
solemn  arches  and  the  collectors  of  these  innumerable 
relics,  as  he  repeated  their  names  and  recounted  their 
achievements.  If  the  friends  of  Joseph  of  Arimathea 
had  built  the  little  wicker-work  church,  and  if  they  had, 
at  the  suggestion  of  the  angel  Gabriel,  as  he  believed, 
dedicated  it  to  the  Blessed  Virgin,  and  buried  the  bones 
of  Joseph  there,  he  had  bound  the  destinies  of  Church 
and  State  together  by  erecting  the  King's  apartments. 
If,  nearly  fourteen  hundred  years  before,  the  ancient  and 
decayed  wattled  church  had  been  replaced  by  the  labor 
of  the  pious  hands  of  Saints  Phaganus  and  Duravanus, 
and,  as  the  result,  there  had  been  dedicated  another  to 
Saint  Michael  the  Archangel,  Abbot  Richard  had  erected 
that  lovely  shrine,  known  as  the  Chapel  of  Our  Lady  of 
Loretto.  Where  the  twelve  anchorets  which  Lucius  had 
placed  on  the  island,  to  live  for  the  most  part  on  bread 
and  water,  and  to  adorn  piety  with  the  painful  seclusions 
of  asceticism,  had  conquered  the  Druids,  there  the  trav- 
eller of  to-day  sees  the  small  almshouse  and  chapel  for 
women.  Abbot  Richard's  mitre  hangs  yet  over  a  full- 
blown rose,  both  mitre  and  rose  having  been  cut  in  stone 
making  an  armorial  supported  by  greyhounds  and  dated 
1512. 

The  abbot  pointed  out  these  new  buildings  to  Erasmus 


UNPLEASANT  VISITORS.  75 

and  More,  unconsciously  suggesting  that  they  were  most 
excellent  testimonies  to  the  vitality  of  his  faith. 

"When  the  new  learning  is  dead,"  he  customarily 
had  said  to  Brother  Lysand,  who  always  agreed  with  his 
orthodoxy  of  belief,  and  drank  largely  of  his  most  de- 
lightful wines,  "  then  that  escutcheon  will  be  still  sur- 
mounting the  entrance." 

They  were  now  standing  at  the  entrance  of  St.  Bene- 
dict's Church,  near  the  vase  which  held  the  consecrated 
water;  the  abbot  had  pointed  to  the  initials  above, 
"  R.  B.,"  and  his  eye  was  still  fixed  upon  the  mitre  and 
garter  which  surmounted  the  escutcheon. 

"  You  would  lessen  my  authority,"  said  the  abbot,  as 
he  saw  Erasmus  assume  the  attitude  of  a  man  simply 
tolerant  of  the  opinions  of  his  proud  host. 

"  No,"  answered  the  scholar.  "  I  beg  you  to  know 
that  the  authority  you  have  over  these  men  seems  to  be 
gracious  and  beneficent.  But  even  above  an  abbot  and 
numerous  ceremonies,  is  the  authority  of  Christ.  The 
escutcheon  will  fall,  if  the  foundation  of  St.  Benedict's 
Church  be  not  that  of  the  Holy  Apostles." 

"  I  would  not  have  the  boy  Vian  live  in  the  midst  of 
such  faithless  reasonings.  Scholar  that  you  are,  the  wis- 
dom of  this  world  has  misled  you." 

Erasmus  smiled.  His  friend  saw  a  sword  glitter  in 
that  smile. 

At  this  juncture  More  thought  he  saw  a  chance  to 
reconcile  two  men  whose  antagonism  of  thought  and 
conviction  had  made  courtesy  almost  impossible. 

"  The  boy  must  get  accustomed  to  the  daytime,"  re- 
plied he  to  his  own  questions.  And  then  he  said  to  the 
abbot :  "  The  new  learning  has  come.  I  believe  it  will 
remain.  But  Erasmus  and  I  do  not  agree  in  all  things. 
Master  Erasmus  and  I  had  a  controversy  this  day.  I 
fear  with  you,  Lord  Abbot,  that  some  of  the  foundations 
of  the  holy  faith  may  be  touched  profanely." 


?6  MONK  AND  KNIGHT. 

The  abbot  was  more  than  delighted.  His  loneliness 
was  gone.  Thomas  More  and  Erasmus  had  found  a 
difference  of  opinion  on  religious  matters  !  It  might 
lead  to  the  discrediting  of  the  influence  of  the  former  in 
England.  More  was  growing  more  powerful  every  day. 
Abbot  Richard  really  distrusted  and  certainly  feared  this 
wily  and  scholarly  friend  of  More.  He  was  provoked 
that  in  Church  and  State  he  was  so  highly  honored. 
More's  politics  he  also  detested.  But  he  could  endure 
anything  from  his  faithlessness  as  to  the  king's  authority, 
if  only  he  found  him  a  substantial  and  loyal  Churchman 
in  this  crisis.  The  only  thing  against  More,  in  the  ab- 
bot's mind,  was  his  close  association  with  the  men  of 
the  new  learning.  He  was  rejoiced  that  he  and  Eras- 
mus had  found  themselves  in  controversy  at  Glastonbury. 
The  solemn  grandeur  of  the  abbey  had  exercised  a 
beneficial  influence  on  the  young  politician.  Dare  the 
wily  foreigner  make  him  a  laughing-stock  in  his  writ- 
ings, if  Thomas  More  could  be  found  on  the  abbot's 
side  in  the  debate  ?  The  abbot  became  both  cheery  and 
dogmatic. 

"  Believe  that  you  eat  and  you  do  eat,"  said  More, 
who,  in  an  argument  on  the  real  presence  of  Christ  in  the 
consecrated  wafer,  had  been  worsted,  and  now  began 
again,  this  time  in  the  presence  of  the  abbot,  to  insist 
upon  the  power  of  faith. 

"  Yes ;  well  said  !  Truly  spoken  were  those  brave 
words,  Thomas  More  !  Be  not  fearful  in  the  presence 
of  a  great  scholar.  How  great  is  faith  !  how  great  is 
faith  !  " 

The  abbot  was  full  of  glee,  as  he  spoke ;  but  Thomas 
More,  who  knew  that  there  was  no  argument  in  the  digni- 
tary's hilarity  in  discovering  in  him  an  opponent  of  Eras- 
mus on  the  doctrine  of  transubstantiation,  who  also  felt 
that  perhaps  he  had  said  all  that  could  be  said  on  that 
side,  who  saw  clearly  that  Erasmus  was  as  calm  and  self- 


UNPLEASANT  VISITORS. 


77 


possessed  as  is  a  trained  army  in  the  field  against  a  single 
company  of  raw  recruits,  was  ominously  silent. 

The  abbot  spoke  again  :  "  The  whole  substance  of  the 
bread  and  wine  is  without  doubt  converted  into  the  Body 
and  Blood  of  Christ.  Let  him  who  doubts  it  know  that 
his  soul  has  forfeited  the  propitiation  of  Christ  himself." 

Erasmus  was  still  calm  and  silent.  Vian  brought  a 
flower  and  placed  it  in  the  thin,  white  hand  of  the 
scholar. 

More  was  uneasy  lest  the  abbot  should  go  too  far.  He 
knew  how  undisturbed  was  the  mind  of  his  friend.  He 
could  not  bear,  however,  for  his  own  mental  comfort,  to 
see  him  practically  excommunicated  by  the  ardent  abbot. 

In  every  way  Erasmus  was  superior  to  Richard  Beere. 
He  could  not  endure  any  lordly  assumption  of  moral  or 
mental  governance  upon  the  part  of  the  abbot.  They 
were  his  guests ;  but  now  the  fire  of  theological  contro- 
versy threatened  to  destroy  all  friendly  relations.  More 
than  this,  was  Thomas  More  quite  aware  that  the  abbot 
had  made  astonishing  revelations  of  the  weakness  of  his 
positions.  He  knew  the  abbot  had  not  hitherto  thought 
well  of  him,  because  in  Parliament  he  had  defeated  the 
plans  of  his  royal  benefactor  Henry  VII.  It  was  amus- 
ing and  disgusting  to  him  that  all  his  own  political  faults 
had  been  instantly  pardoned,  so  soon  as  he  was  found  to 
be  in  some  way  antagonistic  to  the  dangerous  iconoclasm 
of  Erasmus  the  theologian.  He  also  remembered  that 
Erasmus  in  previous  conversations,  when  no  hospitable 
abbot  was  present  to  be  treated  with  courtesy,  had 
addressed  to  him  arguments  as  to  the  falsity  of  the 
church  idea  of  transubstantiation  which  he  had  been 
unable  to  answer.  He  now  discovered  that  the  learned 
abbot,  who  was  trained  in  theology,  was  no  better  pre- 
pared for  these  volleys  which  were  sure  to  come  than 
he  himself  had  been.  He  dreaded  to  have  Erasmus 
open  his  mouth  again.  Great  buildings  and  a  proud 


78  MONK  AND  KNIGHT. 

abbot  were  no  refuge  against  the  storm  which  this  man 
was  helping  to  bring  upon  the  corruption  and  dogmatism 
of  the  Church.  One  sentence  occupied  his  mind, — 
"  Believe  that  you  eat,  and  you  do  eat ;  "  and  it  seemed 
very  unsatisfactory  to  the  young  statesman. 

To  his  infinite  relief,  Erasmus  began  to  speak  of 
the  beauty  of  the  chapel,  which  stood  before  them  on 
Tor  Hill.  It  had  been  dedicated  to  Saint  Michael  the 
Archangel.  Even  yet  one  may  see  the  figure  of  the 
archangel  powerfully  sculptured  above  the  portal  of 
the  remaining  tower,  as  he  weighs  in  a  pair  of  balances 
the  Devil  against  the  Bible.  Erasmus  gazed  upon  the 
figures  for  a  moment,  and  discovering  an  attendant  imp 
trying  to  pull  down  the  scale  in  which  the  Devil  sits, 
dryly  said,  — 

"  My  Lord  Abbot,  is  the  name  of  that  imp,  Ignorantia, 
—  the  ignorance  of  the  priesthood  ?  I  see  he  is  making 
the  Bible  to  appear  very  light  in  the  scale." 

More  felt  that  a  newly  discovered  and  most  unpleasant 
quality  of  the  mind  of  Erasmus  had  disclosed  itself.  He 
was  surprised  and  annoyed  that  this  man  of  culture,  who 
often  desired  peace  at  any  price,  who  so  thoroughly  de- 
tested revolution,  should  prod  the  hospitable  abbot  with 
such  sharp  questions.  Erasmus,  on  the  contrary,  was  for 
once  consistent.  He  proposed  to  reform  the  opinions 
of  the  Church  from  within. 

The  abbot  was  silent,  save  to  mumble  words  of  grati- 
tude that  Vian  was  far  enough  away  to  miss  hearing  that 
question ;  while  More  openly  but  affectionately  reproved 
Erasmus,  largely  for  the  reason  that  he  would  soothe  the 
wounded  soul  of  Richard  Beere. 

"  I  suppose,"  said  Erasmus,  "  it  is  true  to  say,  '  Be- 
lieve I  am  honest  in  my  question,  and  I  am  honest,'  or 
'  Believe  that  that  little  stone  imp  up  there  is  the  igno- 
rance of  our  clergy,  and  it  is  the  ignorance  of  our  clergy ; ' 
but  I  have  better  reason  and  surer  faith  than  that  which 


UNPLEASANT  VISITORS.  79 

kneels  before  a  consecrated  wafer  and  says,  '  Believe 
that  you  eat,  and  you  do  eat,'  when  I  say  that  no  other 
power  is  making  the  Bible  so  light  and  useless  as  the 
ignorance  of  the  priests  of  the  Holy  Church." 

Vian  had  now  come  close  to  the  trembling  and  irri- 
tated abbot,  and  he  heard  the  deliberate  statement  of 
the  scholar. 

"  Even  if  you  believe  it,  it  is  perilous  wickedness  to 
proclaim  it,"  said  the  abbot,  with  petulance. 

"I  proclaim  it  inside  the  heavy  and  strong  walls  of 
an  abbey,  and  to  the  Lord  Abbot  of  Glastonbury.  I 
have  written  of  the  sin  and  ignorance  of  the  monk.  He 
complains  that  his  authority  is  lessened  by  our  means, 
and  that  he  is  made  a  laughing-stock  in  my  writings. 
The  fact  is,  he  offers  himself  as  an  object  of  ridicule  to 
all  men  of  education  and  sense ;  and  this  without  end. 
I  repel  slander.  But  if  learned  and  good  men  think  ill 
of  a  man  who  directs  slander  at  one  who  has  not  de- 
served it,  which  is  it  fair  to  consider  the  accountable 
person,  —  he  who  rightly  repels  what  he  ought  not  to  ac- 
knowledge, or  he  who  injuriously  sets  it  afoot?  If  a  man 
were  to  be  laughed  at  for  saying  that  asses  in  Brabant 
have  wings,  would  he  not  himself  make  the  laughing 
matter?  However,  I  must  be  silent,  because  Thomas 
More  and  you  agree  on  one  philosophy :  '  Believe  that 
the  asses  of  Brabant  have  wings,  and  the  asses  of  Brabant 
have  wings.'  " 

Vian,  poor  child,  was  very  thirsty;  and  the  abbot 
gladly  led  the  way  to  the  spring  which,  ages  before,  had 
refreshed  the  thirsty  Saint  Dunstan. 

"  Foolish  journey  for  the  boy  !  "  said  Erasmus  to  More, 
quietly,  seemingly  careless  when  he  knew  the  youthful 
face  was  illumined  with  a  glowing  interest  in  what  he  then 
said  :  "  '  Believe  that  you  drink  and  you  do  drink.'  Oh, 
Thomas  More  !  I  have  not  sufficiently  praised  folly." 


CHAPTER  VI. 

A   NOVICE   AND    FUGITIVE. 

"  To  the  island-valley  of  Avilion, 

Where  falls  not  hail,  or  rain,  or  any  snow, 
Nor  ever  wind  blows  loudly ;  but  it  lies 
Deep-meadowed,  happy,  fair  with  orchard-lawns 
And  bowery  billows  crowned  with  summer  sea." 

No  wonder  your  school  raises  a  storm,  for  it  is  like  the  wooden  horse  in 
which  armed  Greeks  were  hidden  for  the  ruin  of  barbarous  Troy.  —  From 
M ore's  Letter  to  John  Co  let. 

ABBOT  RICHARD  was  called  to  attend  to  some  of 
the  duties  connected  with  his  high  position.  Fra 
Giovanni,  whose  reading  of  the  Vulgate  we  have  heard 
at  dinner,  and  whose  uniform  kindness  and  curious  tales 
had  already  bound  Vian  to  him  with  closest  affection, 
came  to  show  to  the  guests  other  interesting  relics  of 
the  abbey. 

Coughing  continually  and  smiling  at  all  times,  he 
trudged  along,  with  the  hand  of  Vian  in  his  own,  making 
himself  quite  agreeable,  and  rapidly  becoming  more  in- 
teresting to  Erasmus  than  were  even  the  shirt  of  Gildas 
and  the  coffins  of  Arthur  and  Guinevere. 

Giovanni  had  a  strange  history.  The  name  an- 
nounced not  only  his  Italian  extraction,  but  much  the 
same  uncertainty  of  family  connections  as  is  suggested 
by  the  commonest  of  names.  It  is  doubtful  whether  he 


A   NOVICE  AND  FUGITIVE.  8 1 

would  have  been  owned  by  any  family  of  Rome,  which 
city  had  been  his  birthplace,  or  whether  his  independent 
and  self-sufficient  soul  would  have  willingly  identified 
himself  with  even  the  proudest  family  whose  name  was 
known  by  the  Caesars.  He  was  of  fine  ancestry,  so  far 
as  the  aristocracy  of  brains  and  culture  might  go.  He 
knew  himself  to  be  the  unacknowledged  son  of  a  cer- 
tain Italian  cardinal,  whose  features  were  most  marvel- 
lously reproduced  in  his  own  face,  and  whose  passionate 
love  for  the  classic  arts  and  classic  letters  was  an  enthu- 
siasm, if  not  a  worship,  in  the  soul  of  his  child. 

All  this  Erasmus  also  knew,  from  a  clerical  friend  in 
Venice,  who  had  known  Fra  Giovanni  at  the  papal  court. 
The  scholar  had  also  been  informed  that  the  Italian  had, 
in  1508,  been  persuaded  by  the  Pope  himself  to  go  to 
England  for  a  consideration  in  the  shape  of  certain  man- 
uscripts and  books  of  almost  priceless  value,  which  he 
was  allowed  to  take  with  him.  And  further,  Erasmus 
knew  that  Abbot  Richard  Beere  had,  for  a  consideration 
also,  agreed  to  make  him  at  home  at  Glastonbury. 

The  real  reason  of  the  Pope's  desire  that  Fra  Giovanni 
should  be  out  of  Italy  lay  in  this,  —  that,  unluckily  for  his 
Holiness  Julius  II.,  the  eye  of  this  active  monk  had  be- 
held certain  letters  which  had  passed  between  a  certain 
enemy  of  Maximilian  and  the  Pope,  —  letters  of  which 
no  one  had  previously  had  knowledge,  save  the  Pope, 
death  having  partially  hid  the  secret  in  the  grave  of  the 
correspondent,  —  letters,  it  must  be  added,  whose  char- 
acter and  witness  were  so  against  his  Holiness  as  to  de- 
mand the  death  or  banishment  of  any  beside  the  Pope 
who  might  have  read  them.  With  the  art  of  a  trained 
politician,  the  Pope  had  also  accomplished  the  purpose 
of  having,  as  he  supposed,  close  to  the  ear  and  lips  of  the 
most  powerful  abbot  in  England,  a  trusty  and  yet  not 
too  pious  servant.  Richard  Beere  was  compensated,  al- 
though this  same  Fra  Giovanni  would  often  annoy  him, 
VOL.  i.  —  6 


82  MONK  AND  KNIGHT. 

as  the  Pope  knew.  Italy,  at  least,  would  be  free  from  a 
curious  monk,  whose  secret  would  not  be  told ;  and  per- 
haps the  same  prying  curiosity  which  had  made  such 
discoveries  in  the  house  of  the  Pope  might  be  able  to 
obtain  secrets  equally  valuable  to  the  papal  chair,  from 
an  abbot  whose  place  in  Parliament  and  at  the  court  of 
Henry  VII.  was  powerful. 

The  truth  was  that  Fra  Giovanni  had  not  been  in 
Glastonbury  a  month,  before  he  was  the  abbot's  master. 
His  ability  to  discover  a  skeleton  in  some  closet,  and  to 
stand  near  unto  it,  pointing  out  to  the  guilty  and  know- 
ing ones  how  easily  he  could  create  a  perfect  bedlam  in 
the  room  of  existent  serenity  and  happiness,  was  never  so 
self-conscious  nor  so  autocratic  as  now. 

Scandalous  stories  had  been  in  circulation  concerning 
two  of  the  priors  to  whom  Abbot  Richard  had  been 
under  long  and  painful  obligations.  Fra  Giovanni  found 
out  every  detail  of  the  affair,  and  gave  the  frightened 
priors  sufficient  information  to  make  them  miserable  and 
obedient.  A  wretched  series  of  circumstances  connect- 
ing the  abbot  himself  with  a  foul  transaction  had  been 
surveyed  and  resurveyed,  measured  and  accurately  de- 
scribed, so  that  Giovanni,  in  a  low  but  terrible  voice,  one 
day  displayed  to  the  abbot  so  much  of  that  body  of 
facts  which  he  possessed,  that  though  he  himself  avowed 
his  faith  in  the  abbot's  innocence,  this  ecclesiastical  dig- 
nitary quivered  before  Giovanni's  whisper,  and  begged 
like  a  slave  for  his  gracious  protection.  With  a  sceptre 
of  scandal,  this  solitary  priest  dominated,  so  far  as  he  de- 
sired, the  entire  abbey.  He  was  above  all  rules,  superior 
to  all  traditions,  the  master  of  all  customs,  —  his  own 
law  and  guide. 

He  had  the  most  sad  and  broken  of  asthmatic  voices, 
and  was  the  picture  of  quiescent  truthfulness ;  yet  when 
he  desired  any  position  in  the  abbey,  another  was  dis- 
placed. At  meals  he  read  the  passage  of  Scripture.  He 


A   NO V 'ICE  AND  FUGITIVE.  83 

chose  this  place,  because  while  he  read  he  could  with  a 
piercing  glance  look  over  upon  Richard  Beere,  Lord 
Abbot  of  Glastonbury,  as  he  was  ordering  monks  about 
like  so  many  slaves  or  making  a  visiting  duke  his 
puppet,  and  he  could  inform  his  lordship  in  absolute 
silence  that  he  also  had  a  master  whom  he  must  not 
offend. 

Another  throne  of  power  belonged  to  Giovanni.  He 
himself  was  chief,  and  indeed  for  a  time  sole  flagellant 
for  the  abbey.  Abbot  Richard  might  go  to  Parliament 
with  a  gorgeous  retinue,  but  he  never  knew  when  Fra 
Giovanni  might  demand  the  privilege  of  flogging  him. 
Giovanni  chuckled  when  he  thought  of  how  tenderly  he 
would  administer  the  long  birchen  rods  to  the  back  of 
this  spiritual  lord.  With  no  faith  whatever  in  the  men, 
the  motives,  or  the  hopes  of  the  Holy  Church,  he  was 
a  happy  fixture  at  Glastonbury  Abbey. 

Erasmus  tried  to  get  the  scholarly  Giovanni  to  talk 
books,  manuscripts,  and  Greek  art.  Everybody  who 
could,  or  dared,  was  affecting  interest  in  the  Renaissance  ; 
but  Fra  Giovanni,  who  knew  far  more  than  did  Erasmus 
of  the  delectable  gossip  attending  the  revival  of  learning 
in  Italy,  refused  sullenly  to  speak  except  with  irony. 

"  This  is  holy  ground,"  said  he.  "  The  profane  Greeks 
must  not  snuff  this  air.  Nostrils  like  mine,  so  used  to 
this  sacred  atmosphere,  must  not  be  polluted  by  odors 
from  the  ^Egean.  Weary-all  Hill  is  higher  than  the 
Acropolis ;  and  the  Lord  Abbot's  kitchen  is  more  to  be 
desired  than  the  Erectheon." 

"Especially  at  meal-time,"  said  Erasmus,  who  per- 
ceived the  excellent  raillery. 

"  Here,"  said  Giovanni,  as  he  affected  not  to  notice 
the  words  of  his  interlocutor,  —  "  here  is  this  boy,  whose 
pious  mother  has  sent  him  here  to  be  kept  from  the 
posthumous  influence  of  a  man  named  John  Wycliffe,  a 
reforming  clerk  of  Lutterworth,  who  translated  the  Bible  ; 


84  MONK  AND  KNIGHT. 

and,  the  saints  will  witness  !  my  Lord  Abbot  has  been 
allowing  him  to  be  with  one  who  laughs  at  the  proposi- 
tion on  which  stands  the  doctrine  of  transubstantiation, 
*  Believe  you  eat,  and  you  do  eat.'  " 

"Did  Vian  tell  you  of  our  unhappy  controversy?" 
asked  More. 

"  Yes,  indeed,"  answered  Giovanni,  with  a  smile  ; 
"  and  I  doubt  not  his  Wycliffite  blood  is  tingling  yet  with 
his  inborn  opposition  to  the  blessed  doctrine  of  transub- 
stantiation. He  is  a  bright  boy,  —  bright  enough,  Mas- 
ter Thomas  More,  to  be  the  pride  of  all  of  this  abbey  and 
the  hope  of  all  of  us  who  believe  in  '  the  new  learning.' 
The  abbot  will  bless  him,  and  we  will  educate  him. 
But  I  must  return  to  holier  things  than  the  education 
of  a  youth  in  profane  learning.  The  saints  forgive  me  !  " 

Even  More  perceived  the  point  of  his  satire.  The 
monk  was  very  happy  and  gracious.  They  were  now 
standing  in  front  of  this  inscription  :  — 

"  Hie  JACET  ARTURUS,  FLOS  REGUM,  GLORIA  REGNI, 
QUEM  MORES  PROBITAS  COMMENDANT  LAUDE  PERENNI, 
VERSUS  HENRICI  SWANSEY  ABBATIS  GLASTON. 

ARTURI  JACET  me  CONJUX  TUMULTA  SECUNDA 

MERUIT   C^ELOS    VIRTUTEM    PROIE   SECUNDA." 


Fra  Giovanni  advanced  solemnly  to  the  black  mauso- 
leum which  he  averred  contained  the  bones. 

"  Bones  are  more  sacred  than  brains,"  he  remarked. 

"  These  are  bones  of  King  Arthur  of  the  Round  Table," 
said  More. 

"  Well,"  remarked  his  friend,  "  the  king's  bones  were 
the  bones  of  a  more  honorable  man  than  are  those  I  am 
accustomed  to  have  to  kneel  before.  For  my  part,  I  am 
worn  out  at  the  knees  with  crawling  before  the  bones  of 
saints  who  were  not  saintly." 

Vian  was  amazed,  and  then  he  smiled  at  the  idea.     It 


A   NOVICE  AND  FUGITIVE.  85 

reminded  him  of  what  the  heretics  of  Lutterworth  used 
to  say  about  saints'  bones. 

"  They  tell  us  that  Guinevere's  yellow  hair  was  found 
nicely  braided  when  the  coffin  of  hollowed  oak  was 
opened,"  said  Giovanni. 

"  The  braiding  of  her  locks  was  probably  the  last  touch 
of  the  affectionate  hands  of  Sir  Lancelot,"  added  More, 
with  a  smile. 

"Have  you  no  more  disgusting  relics  than  these?" 
asked  the  scholar.  "  I  have  been  so  accustomed  to  those 
that  empty  me  of  my  dinner  that  I  do  not  feel  sufficiently 
impressed  by  these." 

Even  Giovanni  smiled ;  and  then  he  proceeded  to 
lead  the  way  through  the  long  cloisters,  beneath  many  of 
the  arches  which  lie  upon  the  ground  to-day.  At  length 
they  stood  before  the  hair  shirt  of  Gildas.  More  placed 
his  hand  upon  it ;  and  Erasmus  said,  — 

"  Is  this  the  shirt  which  he  never  exchanged  for  a 
cleaner  garment?  " 

"The  same,"  said  Giovanni.     "  It  is  very  sacred." 

"  I  notice  it  has  the  odor  of  sanctity.  I  believe  now 
that  this  holy  man  never  washed  himself,  and  was  unclean 
enough  to  be  canonized.  Is  it  not  true  ?  " 

"  Quite  true,"  replied  the  monk.  "  Time  is  a  base 
heretic,  for  this  shirt  does  not  smell  so  badly  as  it  did 
once." 

At  that  moment  the  abbot  appeared.  He  noticed 
that  Vian  avoided  him,  and  he  interpreted  it  as  follows  : 
The  boy  had  been  caught  again  in  the  apartment  of  a 
certain  young  monk  who  had  read  to  him  the  odes  of 
Horace  and  many  of  the  plays  of  Lucian.  That  young 
monk  was  now  to  be  severely  flogged  by  Giovanni ;  and 
Vian  had  found  it  out,  and  loving  him  whom  he  thought 
of  as  his  literary  benefactor,  he  had  conceived  a  fear  of 
the  abbot. 

The  truth  was,  the  boy  knew  nothing  of  the  proposed 


86  MONK  AND  KNIGHT. 

flogging ;  but  he  did  feel  within  his  heart  a  strange 
homesickness  for  Lutterworth,  and  a  longing  desire  to 
accompany  More  and  Erasmus,  when  they  should  bid 
farewell  to  the  abbot  and  the  hospitalities  of  Glaston- 
bury  Abbey.  It  was  well  that  he  did  not  dare  to  mention 
this,  save  to  Fra  Giovanni. 

The  next  day  Abbot  Richard  was  busy  with  the  Arch- 
bishop of  York.  While  Giovanni  was  laughing  with  the 
monk  whom  he  had  been  sent  to  flog,  the  illustrious  trav- 
ellers were  slowly  making  their  way  out  of  the  abbey, 
repeating  the  controversies  of  the  past  few  days. 

Vian  — boy  that  he  was  —  was  broken-hearted  at  part- 
ing with  two  men  so  unlike  monks  in  the  freedom  of 
their  spirits,  so  manly  in  their  thought.  Giovanni  had  al- 
lowed him  to  follow  him  about  from  one  place  to  another, 
until  his  tear-filled  eyes  were  actually  beholding  the 
simulation  of  a  flogging.  Administered  to  whom?  To 
the  radiant- faced  young  monk  who  had  read  Horace  to 
Vian.  For  what?  For  the  sin  of  instructing  Vian's 
ignorance,  and  acquainting  his  mind  with  one  of  the 
works  of  Roman  genius. 

As  soon  as  the  eyes  of  the  youth  saw  the  bare  back  of 
this  friend  of  his  soul,  the  birchen  rods,  and  the  pitiless 
gesticulations  of  Giovanni,  they  streamed  with  hot  tears. 
He  cried  out  in  a  manly  voice  :  "  I  hate  Lord  Abbot 
Richard  Beere  !  I  hate  you  too,  Fra  Giovanni !  I  hate 
everything  in  this  abbey." 

Pretending  anger,  the  monk  excluded  him  at  once, 
with  words  of  censure  and  contempt.  Vian  was  aflame 
with  hate,  indignation,  and  hope.  Never  did  a  boy's  feet 
carry  him  with  more  speed  than  did  his.  Without  a 
question  from  any  who  saw  him  running,  he  made  his 
way  to  the  great  wall.  Unconquered  by  a  dozen  failures 
to  surmount  it,  his  despair  invented  a  ladder.  At  last  he 
scaled  it.  While  Giovanni,  the  mimic  flagellant,  was  still 
laughing,  as  he  and  the  younger  and  unflogged  monk  read 


.  A   NOVICE  AND  FUGITIVE.  87 

a  play  of  Terence  in  that  quiet  cell  which  was  supposed 
to  be  a  place  of  private  punishment ;  while  also  Abbot 
Richard  was  solemnly  bewailing  to  the  Archbishop  the 
state  of  the  Church,  the  spread  of  Greek  thought,  and 
especially  the  influence  of  Erasmus  upon  the  clergy  and 
laity,  —  this  eager  son  of  a  Lollard  was  running  unwea- 
riedly,  through  heat  and  dust,  in  pursuit  of  the  two 
travellers,  who  had  been  detained  at  the  gate,  and  had 
just  now  gone  out  of  his  sight. 


CHAPTER  VII. 

A    FRENCH    CHATEAU. 

Men  began  to  hunt  more  after  words  than  matter,  and  more  after  the 
choiceness  of  the  phrase,  and  the  round  and  clean  composition  of  the  sen- 
tence, and  the  sweet  falling  of  the  clauses,  and  the  varying  and  illustration 
of  their  works  with  tropes  and  figures,  than  after  the  weight  of  matter, 
worth  of  subject,  soundness  of  argument,  life  of  invention,  or  depth  of 
judgment.  Then  grew  the  flowing  and  watery  vein  of  Osorius,  the  Por- 
tugal Bishop,  to  be  in  price ;  then  did  Sturmius  spend  such  infinite  and 
curious  pains  upon  Cicero  the  orator  and  Hermogenes  the  rhetorician,  be- 
sides his  own  books  of  periods  and  imitation,  and  the  like.  Then  did  Car 
of  Cambridge,  and  Ascham,  with  their  lectures  and  writings  almost  deify 
Cicero  and  Demosthenes,  and  allure  all  young  men  that  were  studious  into 
that  delicate  and  polished  kind  of  learning.  Then  did  Erasmus  take  oc- 
casion to  make  the  scoffing  echo,  Decent  annos  consumpsi  in  legendo 
Cicerone ;  and  the  echo  answered  in  Greek :  HNE,  Asine.  —  LORD 
BACON. 

WHILE,  next  day,  over  that  English  roadway  Vian 
was  making  his  way  back  to  Glastonbury  Abbey, 
under  the  care  of  a  friendly  sub-prior  who  had  been 
nearly  a  day  in  overtaking  him,  the  following  conversation 
was  occurring  in  one  of  the  most  lovely  of  the  castles  of 
France  :  — 

"  Make  him  a  knight  and  a  scholar." 

"  That  can  easily  be  accomplished.  He  has  the  figure 
and  spirit  of  Bayard  himself,  and  he  knows  manuscripts 
now  as  no  scholar  of  the  Sorbonne  ever  knew  them  at 
such  an  age." 

These  remarks  were  made  by  two  men,  —  rather,  let 


A   FRENCH  CHATEAU.  89 

us  acknowledge,  by  a  youth,  and  a  man  past  middle 
age,  both  of  whom  stood  within  the  walls  of  the  chateau 
of  Amboise.  This  chateau  in  the  early  part  of  the  six- 
teenth century  crowned  the  summit  of  a  huge  rock  over- 
looking the  Loire,  as  it  wound  by  the  town  of  Tours, 
through  the  shady  gardens  and  below  the  purple  vine- 
yards which  constituted  what  was  called  "  the  Orchard 
of  France." 

These  men  had  just  come  from  Loches.  Quietly  and 
unobserved,  they  had  made  certain  plans  in  that  unfre- 
quented spot,  which  was  associated  with  the  remorse  of 
a  queen;  the  splendid  oratory  which  still  stands  as  a 
memorial  of  the  repentance  which  was  never  absent 
from  the  mind  of  Anne  of  Brittany,  so  long  as  she  re- 
membered the  broken-hearted  daughter  of  Louis  XL,  — 
Jeane  of  France,  —  from  whom  she  had  stolen  a  husband, 
Louis  XII.  The  delay  was  over ;  a  week  of  labor  at  pay- 
ing special  attention  to  Louis  XII.  had  been  endured ; 
and  they  were  glad  to  be  back  again  at  the  residence  of 
Louise  of  Savoy,  where  these  plans  could  be  carried  out. 

The  first  speaker  was  a  youth  of  magnificent  presence 
and  lofty  bearing;  the  second  was  a  somewhat  aged 
knight  who  had  been  wounded  in  battle.  The  latter  was 
scarred,  but  impressive  in  his  appearance,  prematurely 
white-haired,  limping  as  he  walked,  eloquent  and  learned 
in  his  every  utterance,  and  evidently  obedient  in  every 
courtesy  toward  the  tall  and  stately  youth  who  stood 
before  him.  The  old  man  was  known  to  the  King  Louis 
XII.  and  his  court  as  Nouvisset.  The  younger  was 
called  Francois,  Due  d'Angouleme,  who  was  soon  to  be 
known  to  the  world  as  Francis  L,  King  of  France. 

Together  they  walked  to  the  spot  on  which  Caesar  is  said 
to  have  stood  when  he  was  so  struck  with  the  unique 
value  of  the  position  in  war  that  he  ordered  a  tower 
crowned  with  a  statue  of  Mars  to  be  built  thereon.  They 
looked  forth  upon  the  Arcadian  landscape.  Neither, 


90  MONK  AND  KNIGHT. 

however,  was  observant  of  its  genial  beauty.  The  young 
duke  had  his  eye  upon  the  figure  of  another  youth,  who 
was  standing  alone  on  the  gentle  slope,  quite  carelessly 
gazing  upon  the  winding  river.  As  the  boy  turned  and 
walked  briskly  toward  the  gallery  which  overlooked  the 
flowing  stream,  his  face  came  in  full  view. 

As  he  came  nearer,  his  whole  personality  became  more 
interesting.  The  unique  qualities  which  uttered  their 
silent  history  in  his  gait,  his  attitude,  his  fine  nostril, 
and  full  forehead,  commanded  attention.  He  was  but 
a  boy,  yet  ages  of  human  experience  with  various  forces 
and  of  deepest  significance  burned  in  that  glance.  His 
clear  eye  was  neither  sharp  nor  stern,  but  its  light 
was  wonderfully  penetrating,  —  after  the  manner  of  a 
voice  which  carries  well  because  it  is  musical.  Medita- 
tion upon  some  fancied  wrong  might  have  opened  those 
solemn  deeps  which  lay  all  discovered  to  one  who 
would  peer  into  its  liquid  infinities.  It  was  not  at  all 
sentimental  in  its  open  hospitality ;  it  was  simply  frank 
and  full  in  the  revelation  which  it  made  that  the  soul 
behind  it  felt  the  infinite  significance  of  life,  and  knew 
not  enough  of  the  narrow  policies  of  men,  in  the  midst  of 
its  problems,  even  to  hide  his  awful  sense  of  life's  mys- 
tery. His  face  had  the  free  flowing  lines  which  are 
found  in  the  pictures  of  Raphael,  but  it  was  not  wholly 
Italian.  His  careless  yet  noble  attitude  often  reminded 
one,  who  had  lived  with  portraits,  of  the  earlier  knights  of 
France ;  yet  more  than  France  stood  in  the  determined 
and  graceful  youth.  Oftentimes  his  compressed  lips 
would  quiver ;  then  the  eyes  would  swim  in  what  seemed 
tears;  and  then  a  single  step  would  reveal  a  youth 
unconsciously  jealous  of  his  own  prerogatives,  perhaps 
impatient  with  himself  that  he  ever  felt  an  uncontrollable 
emotion  within  his  breast. 

"  A  knight  and  a  scholar  he  shall  be,"  said  Nouvisset 
to  the  young  Francis.  "  When  do  we  leave  your  side  ?  " 


A    FRENCH  CHATEAU.  91 

"  Do  not  be  greatly  in  haste,"  answered  the  duke,  as 
he  surveyed  the  youth  with  eyes  of  affection.  "  Nouvisset, 
behold  my  beloved,  as  he  comes  near  to  us  !  My  heart 
breaks  that  we  are  to  part,  even  for  a  little  time.  Where 
is  my  sister  Marguerite?  She  has  loved  to  hear  his 
stories  of  Piedmont.  I  want  him  to  feel  sure  of  our 
affection.  Do  you  think  he  sickens  for  his  mountains?" 

"  No,  my  liege  !  "  answered  the  lame  knight.  "  He  is 
to  know  surely  that  his  whole  family  and  kin  were  slaugh- 
tered. It  must  all  be  so  melancholy  that  he  shall  never 
wish  to  return,  or  ask  questions  about  it.  Every  resource 
of  love  and  every  power  of  the  court,  when  you  are  our 
king,  Sire  !  must  be  used  to  attach  him  to  the  France  of 
the  Church  and  the  king.  He  loves  you  with  a  devotion 
pathetic  and  true.  The  Holy  Church,  if  you  will  it,  must 
surround  him  with  all  that  may  charm  and  fasten  his 
affections  to  her.  He  loves  knighthood  with  every  drop 
of  his  blood.  Mark  you  !  there  is  Italian  blood  in  your 
friend.  Well,  the  charms  of  knighthood,  its  nobility  and 
passion,  must  be  brought  to  him.  He  will  be  your 
Bayard,  mark  me  !  Does  not  Madame  d'Angouleme 
say  he  is  made  for  a  knight?  By  the  soul  of  Gaston 
de  Foix,  as  I  die,  I  shall  live  again  in  that  boy." 

"  And  you  believe  that  he  is  a  scholar  by  nature, 
also?"  asked  the  duke. 

"  By  Saint  Ives,  I  am  sure  he  knows  of  books  which  I 
have  not  heard  of.  An  astonishing  household  it  must 
have  been  in  which  that  child  was  cradled.  Did  he  not 
even  yesterday  pick  up  my  Demosthenes,  fresh  from 
Aldus  himself,  and  printed  in  1504,  and  tell  me  that  one 
lay  on  the  window-sill  in  his  father's  cottage  ?  He  knows 
by  heart  all  the  verses  of  Dante  which  condemn  the 
Guelph  and  annoy  the  Pope.  He  already  has  heard 
somewhere  so  much  of  Petrarch  and  Boccaccio,  that  he 
smiled  at  what  Madame  d'Angouleme  would  think  very 
sacred.  A  scholar?  For  your  purposes,  my  beloved 


92  MONK  AND  KNIGHT. 

Sire,  as  king  of  France  by  and  by,  you  need  a  trusty 
knight,  a  learned  friend,  a  skilful  Churchman.  Would  to 
the  saints  that  this  stalwart  child  of  the  mountains  were 
as  sure  to  be  a  saint  after  the  required  pattern,  as  he 
is  to  be  a  heroic  knight  and  the  first  bibliopole  in 
Europe  !  You  can  keep  your  genius  for  war  and  the 
court,  if  your  gentle  and  studious  friend  is  put  in  charge 
of  all  affairs  of  learning." 

By  this  time  the  mere  boy  concerning  whom  they  had 
been  conversing  was  out  of  sight.  He  was  wandering 
about  in  a  most  playful  mood  with  the  tutor  of  the  son 
of  Madame  d'Angouleme,  which  important  lady  we  shall 
know  as  Louise  of  Savoy.  Her  daughter,  whom  French 
history  knows  first  as  Marguerite,  then  as  Duchesse 
d'Alencon,  and  then  as  Queen  of  Navarre,  was  with 
them. 

Pierre  de  Rohan,  the  instructor,  had  been  asked  by 
the  anxious  Louise  to  estimate  this  youth,  with  whom  her 
son  Francis,  whom  she  already  looked  upon  as  sovereign 
of  France  by  her  lively  governance,  had  fallen  so  deeply 
in  love.  She  had  heard  the  young  Francis  talk  in  the 
most  surprising  way  about  revivals  of  learning,  scholars, 
poets,  printers,  and  lectures  on  law  and  theology ;  and 
quite  unable  as  was  Louise  of  Savoy  to  appreciate  the 
gigantic  forces  of  the  fading  Renaissance  and  those  of 
the  dawning  Reformation,  with  which  any  successor  of 
Louis  XII.  would  have  to  deal,  she  had  perfect  confi- 
dence in  the  good  judgment  of  the  famous  tutor  Pierre 
de  Rohan,  and  in  the  sagacity  and  truthfulness  of  what 
Nouvisset  had  said,  — 

"  Graciously  permit  me  to  say  to  you,  as  the  widow  of 
Charles  d'Angouleme,  cousin  to  the  King  Louis  XIL, 
that  your  husband  knew  that  the  successor  of  Louis  must 
have  a  great  and  wise  scholar  at  his  court.  Knighthood 
will  ever  after  this  have  to  do  with  ideas.  The  man  of 
learning  is  now  the  true  knight." 


A   FRENCH  CHATEAU.  93 

Louise  of  Savoy  was  sometimes  a  superb  politician. 
This  mother  was,  for  the  nonce,  glad  to  hear  her  son 
talking  with  this  remarkably  strong  and  independent 
boy  about  things  which  kings  and  dukes  had  not  cared 
for. 

It  was,  however,  laborious  waiting  for  a  king's  death. 
Even  the  strange  youth  felt  that  the  atmosphere  about 
Amboise  was  very  melancholy.  The  impatient  Madame 
d'Angouleme,  Louise  of  Savoy,  was  only  a  year  older 
than  Anne  of  Brittany,  Queen  of  Louis  XII. ;  but  Anne 
had  rapidly  aged,  as  her  sons  by  Charles  VIII.  or  Louis 
XII.  had  died,  one  after  the  other ;  while,  on  the  other 
hand,  Louise  of  Savoy  had  grown  young,  apparently,  with 
rejoicing,  and  in  contemplating  with  infinite  craft  and 
pleasure  the  future  of  her  handsome,  strong,  and  ambi- 
tious son.  Over  against  the  piety  and  continuous  repent- 
ance of  Anne  were  the  dissolute  gayety  and  avaricious 
ambition  of  Louise.  While,  in  tears,  Queen  Anne  repre- 
sented to  her  husband,  Louis  XII.,  the  immoral  conduct 
of  the  mother  of  Duke  Francis,  she  knew  also  that 
Louise  was  anxiously  hoping  for  the  death  of  the  king. 
He  also  remembered  that  in  1504,  when  all  supposed 
him  to  be  dying  or  dead,  Anne's  valuables  which  she  had 
prematurely  shipped  for  Brittany,  were  seized,  and  that 
afterward  the  audacious  Louise  found  out  that  she  was 
not  yet  Queen  Regent  of  France.  At  first,  when  the 
king  had  been  willing  to  give  the  Princess  Claude  to 
Duke  Francis,  her  mother,  Anne,  had  prevented  her 
attachment  to  the  son  of  the  hated  Louise. 

Marriage  had  come,  however ;  and  death  also  had  at 
last  come,  —  but  the  latter  had  come  only  to  Anne. 
Every  one  at  Amboise  wondered  why  the  king  did  not 
die.  Even  the  young  stranger  told  Nouvisset,  as  the 
latter  opened  up  before  him  the  prospect  of  study 
at  Chilly,  that  he  would  not  care  if  Louis  XII.  should 
die. 


94  MONK  AND  KNIGHT. 

"  You  are  not  ready  to  be  the  intellectual  High  Cham- 
berlain to  his  Majesty,  your  loving  Francis ;  neither  is 
he  ready  to  rule  France,"  said  the  limping  old  soldier. 

"  I  cannot  think  what  you  mean.  We  are'  both  children  : 
I  know  that  full  well.  Madame  d'Angouleme  would  not 
let  him  do  wrong,  if  he  were  king.  But  I  want  to  be  true 
to  him,  if  I  may." 

The  simplicity  of  his  words,  his  evident  honesty  and 
love,  greatly  touched  Nouvisset ;  and  when  he  told 
Francis  and  his  mother,  they  wept,  and  the  haughty 
Louise  was  quite  tender  for  an  entire  afternoon. 

"  Cruel  war  has  its  blessings,"  she  remarked.  "  Who 
could  have  framed  a  prettier  speech?  It  was  a  bright 
omen  for  us,  when  the  bright-eyed  companion  came  to 
him  who  shall  soon  be  king  of  France  !  "  and  she  stood 
by  the  side  of  her  tall,  excellently  proportioned  son, 
touched  his  rich  hair  with  her  hand  of  planning  affection, 
and  then  kissed  him. 

The  Due  d'Angouleme  felt  in  that  mother's  kiss  the 
stiffness  of  a  sceptre  which  she  would  certainly  wield. 
The  crown  of  France  really  seemed  to  have  been  lifted 
from  his  forehead  the  instant  her  slender  and  crafty 
hand  touched  his  hair;  and  Francis  was  haughty  and 
gloomy. 

Every  one  at  court  who  understood  the  feelings  of 
Francis  for  the  strange  youth,  was  worried  because  the 
latter  did  not  seem  happy  with  the  games  at  Amboise. 

"  He  must  be  amused ;  and  if  he  wants  the  compan- 
ionship of  an  army  of  scholars,  let  them  be  gathered 
together." 

The  mother  was  speaking  to  Francis,  her  son,  who 
was  deeply  troubled  at  the  sadness  of  his  companion. 

"  He  must  never  feel  himself  a  prisoner.  He  is  ac- 
customed to  the  mountains  and  great  landscapes;  let 
him  have  the  wines,  and  let  some  one  teach  him  all 
the  games  of  chance  at  Amboise,"  added  she,  determined 


A   FRENCH  CHATEAU.  95 

to  conquer  the  sorrow  which  was  eating  up  the  life  of 
the  boy. 

"  Ah  !  "  said  Nouvisset,  "not  all  the  wines  of  France 
or  the  gambling  of  the  capital  will  charm  that  youth  from 
his  recollections  of  the  books  at  his  father's  cottage. 
Strange  he  does  not  long  for  him  !  He  seems  to  have 
bidden  a  decisive  farewell  to  his  father  and  sister,  be- 
lieving them  to  have  been  slain.  But  he  has  been  bred 
a  student.  His  brain  is  full  of  that  quenchless  ambition 
to  know,  which  characterizes  the  finest  sort  of  mind. 
He  is  a  child  of  learning ;  and  I  believe  him  to  be  the 
hope  of  your  son's  court.  I  ought  to  depart  this  day 
with  him  for  Chilly,  where  he  may  be  educated.  Pray 
do  not  keep  him,  gracious  Madame  !  even  for  your  son's 
present  enjoyment,  where  we  only  wait  for  Louis  XII. 
to  die." 

Francis  and  Ami  —  for  it  was  Ami  Perrin  whose  fine 
face  and  bright  eye  had  made  way  for  admiration  of  the 
higher  qualities  and  more  important  possibilities  of  his 
nature  at  the  chateau  of  Amboise  —  had  been  exploring 
the  contents  of  the  bookcase,  which,  with  its  wired  front 
and  Florentine  silk  linings,  stood  prettily  near  the  window 
in  the  gallery.  Their  companionship  was  sweet  and  pro- 
foundly affectionate. 

The  secret  Francis  could  keep,  and  Ami's  innocent 
faith  pleased  him.  Ami  knew  himself  to  have  been 
brought  from  a  bloody  Waldensian  home.  In  the  fight 
between  the  soldiers  and  the  mountaineers,  he  remem- 
bered to  have  seen  the  hacked  wrists  of  his  father,  whom 
he  now  believed  to  be  in  a  grave  with  little  Alke.  He 
was  not  forgetful  of  that  stunning  blow  upon  his  own 
head,  from  the  effects  of  which  he  did  not  rally  until  he 
found  himself  in  the  hands  of  a  French  captain,  who  had 
nursed  him  to  consciousness  with  untiring  diligence. 
When  about  to  die  of  a  wound  which  Ami  knew  the 
soldier  received  from  Caspar  Perrin  himself,  he  had  lov- 


96  MONK  AND    KNIGHT. 

ingly  given  the  convalescent  Ami  into  the  charge  of  the 
young  duke  Francis.  From  the  hour  of  his  acquaint- 
ance with  this  royal  youth,  Ami  had  been  loved  with 
passionate  tenderness. 

An  astrologer  whom  Francis  had  consulted  had  made 
it  clear  to  this  haughty  Due  d'Angouleme  that  in  this 
youth,  Ami,  lay  fortune  and  destiny.  Ami  had  been  taken 
to  Paris.  The  brilliancy  of  the  court,  the  luxurious 
beauty  of  the  palaces,  the  interest  of  the  games,  the  un- 
imagined  delights  of  the  duke's  promises,  the  opening 
hopes  of  knighthood,  of  which  his  mother  had  told  him 
in  his  childhood ;  the  unique  position  which,  by  his 
training,  he  occupied  in  a  court  already  aglow  with  the 
lights  of  the  Renaissance,  —  all  these  made  life  seem  pic- 
turesque enough,  and  kept  his  spirit  from  perishing 
amidst  sorrowful  recollections. 


CHAPTER  VIII. 

THE    KING   UNDER    GOVERNANCE. 

The  twists  and  cracks  in  our  poor  earthenware, 
That  touch  me  to  more  conscious  fellowship 
(I  am  not  myself  the  finest  Parian) 
With  my  coevals. 

GEORGE  ELIOT. 

VERY  soon  Francis  himself  found  the  throne  upon 
which  this  friendship  had  seated  itself. 
At  the  death  of  Anne,  the  queen,  the  King  of  France 
desired  a  truce  with  England,  such  as  he  had  signed  with 
Ferdinand,  Maximilian,  and  the  Pope.  Princess  Mary, 
sister  of  young  Henry  VIII.,  was  made  a  pledge  of  peace, 
in  spite  of  the  disguised  opposition  of  the  mother  and 
guide  of  the  talented  Due  d'Angouleme.  As  the  young 
queen,  after  the  marriage,  appeared  in  her  regal  loveli- 
ness by  the  side  of  the  trembling  Louis  XII.,  the  reckless 
and  engaging  Francis  was  discovered  to  be  deeply  inter- 
ested in  her  beauty.  In  crises  such  as  this,  only  one 
man  had  hitherto  been  able  to  control  him.  Oh  for  Nou- 
visset  now,  to  keep  the  warm  heart  of  the  already  disso- 
lute Duke  Francis  from  burning  with  an  ardor  which  could 
not  be  controlled  in  the  presence  of  the  fair  English 
princess  !  In  this  instance  even  Nouvisset  had  failed, 
but  the  young  Ami  was  omnipotent. 
VOL.  i.  — 7 


98  MONK  AND  KNIGHT. 

Louise  of  Savoy  became  the  guardian  of  Mary.  Fran- 
cis was  persuaded  to  divide  his  time  between  Ami,  who 
had  wooed  him  back  to  honor,  and  the  pursuit  of  a  wiser 
course  than  that  which  would  permit  of  an  intrigue  with 
the  young  queen. 

In  all  those  efforts  to  prevent  the  imprudence  which 
Francis  had  resolved  upon,  the  cautious  Louise  and  Nou- 
visset,  whom  she  trusted,  were  unwillingly  learning  to  re- 
spect the  talents  and  admire  the  courageous  affection  of 
the  young  mountaineer.  His  conscience  emboldened 
his  love.  Where  no  knight  would  dare  to  tread,  where 
no  king  would  think  of  interfering,  even  into  the  very 
heart  of  the  imperious  Francis,  this  youth  had  entered ; 
and  there  he  had  conquered  by  the  power  of  a  lofty 
friendship.  At  the  castle,  or  ten  miles  away,  from  the 
little  room  in  which  he  soon  found  himself  at  Chilly,  he 
was  soon  ruling  the  future  king. 

"  I  could  not  think  of  his  being  untrue  to  the  faithful 
Claude,"  said  he  to  Nouvisset,  when  the  soldier  bade  him 
know  what  an  unaccountable  influence  he  exercised  upon 
the  fiery  soul  of  Francis. 

Louise  of  Savoy  was  angry,  and  then  was  persuaded  to 
be  wise. 

"  Even  the  love  which  my  son  has  for  me  would  not 
have  availed  to  avert  his  impetuous  course  if  it  had  not 
been  reinforced  by  that  boy,"  said  Louise  of  Savoy,  half 
spitefully,  jealous  in  the  recognition  of  the  fact  that  the 
sovereign  power  which  she  proposed  to  exercise  on  the 
will  of  her  son  in  coming  years  must  often  be  wielded  by 
the  aid  of  another. 

She  could  have  been  more  patient  if  the  boy  had  not 
failed  at  her  court,  the  real  cause  of  which  failure  an- 
noyed her  constantly.  It  cannot  be  said  that  Ami  had 
won  either  distinction  or  self-respect,  as  the  chosen  page 
of  the  arrogant  Louise.  He  had  received  no  training  as 
a  page ;  besides,  Francis  was  a  headstrong  youth,  who 


THE  KING   UNDER   GOVERNANCE.  99 

interfered  with  his  mother's  commands  and  had  his  own 
way,  which  was  often  very  consumptive  of  the  time  which 
Ami  would  otherwise  have  given  to  her  in  the  form  of 
obedient  attentions. 

Nouvisset  had  often  indicated  to  both  mother  and  son 
that  if  this  promising  lad  were  ever  to  become  a  knight 
and  a  scholar,  he  must  have  him  for  some  time  where  he 
could  give  him  proper  training.  The  youth  was  affec- 
tionately bound  to  Francis,  and  yet  was  ambitious  for 
knighthood  and  learning. 

At  last  the  golden  six  months  of  undisturbed  culture 
which  Ami  had  been  promised  with  Nouvisset,  came.  Louis 
XII.  would  not  die ;  Francis  and  Marguerite  kissed  Ami 
farewell ;  Louise  of  Savoy  gave  him  a  book  on  Falconry 
and  her  blessings,  the  worth  of  which  latter  Ami  did  not 
overestimate ;  and  the  lame  knight  set  out  with  the 
young  student  for  Chilly,  which  was  a  village  four  leagues 
from  the  capital,  and  one  with  whose  peasant  population 
Nouvisset  was  perfectly  acquainted. 

There  was  never  a  more  lonely  youth  in  France  than 
Francis,  Due  d'Angouleme,  who,  since  his  marriage  to 
Princess  Claude,  was  also  Due  de  Valois.  He  was  be- 
sieged on  every  side  by  efforts  to  cause  him  to  forget  his 
young  protege"  ;  but  for  many  days  he  lived  stubbornly  in 
his  castle  of  solitude.  He  was  sufficiently  courteous  to 
be  a  pleasant  companion  ;  affectionate  enough  to  his  dar- 
ling sister  Marguerite  ;  sufficiently  full  of  the  policies  and 
ambitions  which  his  mother  shared,  to  study  matters  of 
state ;  religious  enough  in  a  duke's  manner,  and  in  the 
manner  of  the  time,  to  give  hope  to  the  clergy  of  France  ; 
and  fully  as  fond  of  literature  and  art  as  seemed  well 
in  the  eyes  of  a  mother  who  did  not  much  enjoy  the 
grammars  and  manuscripts  of  which  the  nobly  made 
youth  was  so  studious.  Beneath  it  all  there  glowed  the 
passionate  friendship  of  Francis  for  Ami ;  and  above  all 
these  was  a  conviction  that  with  Ami's  future  were  bound 


TOO  MONK  AND  KNIGHT. 

up  the  best  destinies  of  the  kingdom,  for  which  he  hoped. 
The  astrologer  had  made  that  perfectly  plain. 

Even  Marguerite,  at  that  hour  dear  beyond  expression 
to  the  proud  Francis,  lisped  her  protest ;  turning  up  her 
pretty  face,  and  assuming  the  affectionate  authority  which 
her  two  years  of  seniority  gave  her,  when  she  said,  — 

"  Oh,  it  pains  me,  brother  and  lover  that  you  are  to 
me,  that  not  I,  but  a  boy  stolen  from  the  mountains, 
should  have  your  soul  in  his  keeping." 

"  Marguerite  of  Marguerites,"  said  he,  in  that  voice  of 
pathetic  tenderness  with  which  he  had  learned  to  pro- 
nounce the  words,  "  do  not  say  that  to  me.  I  love  you 
beyond  all  else ;  yet  Ami  must  be  loved  also." 

Thus  early  in  their  friendship  began  the  strong  influ- 
ence of  the  orphaned  and  untitled  Waldensian  upon  a 
mind  fitted  in  many  respects  to  be  the  greatest  ruler  in 
Europe ;  fitted  by  so  many  weaknesses,  if  we  may  so 
speak,  to  bring  upon  himself  and  his  country  so  much 
humiliation  and  shame. 

The  jealousy  of  Louise  of  Savoy  and  her  daughter 
Marguerite  was,  however,  more  than  matched  by  the  jeal- 
ousy of  this  youth,  whose  chief  weakness  of  character 
was  this  same  tormenting  passion.  Louise  of  Savoy 
thought  she  had  never  seen  jealousy  until  she  became 
better  acquainted  with  Ami  at  a  later  day.  Nouvisset  had 
remarked  to  the  watchful  Louise  and  the  affectionate 
Marguerite,  that  his  study  of  humanity  had  never  pro- 
cured for  him  such  an  interesting  problem  as  was  this 
engaging  boy. 

"  Surely  these  elaborate  attentions  paid  to  him  by  the 
court  have  grown  within  him  a  deadly  viper,"  said  the 
offended  Marguerite. 

"  With  the  fortune  of  a  waif  and  the  political  pros- 
pects of  a  foundling,  he  is  as  jealous  and  proud  of  his  in- 
fluence with  Francis,  who  will  be  soon  my  king,  as  though 
he  were  the  son  of  the  proudest  knight  or  the  director  of 


THE   KING    UNDER   GOVERNANCE.  IOI 

the  duke's  fortunes,  appointed  by  the  saints  themselves," 
averred  Nouvisset  to  a  bosom  friend. 

The  lame  knight  did  not  then  rightly  judge  of  the 
boy's  political  prospects.  Never  did  a  boy  have  such  a 
future  in  France.  However,  Nouvisset  had  not  overesti- 
mated that  inborn  disposition  to  jealousy  which  had  al- 
ready manifested  itself  in  various  ways.  The  whole  fabric 
of  Ami's  spirit  was  shaken  when  h£  saw  another  ruling  a 
realm  which  he  loved,  or  which  once  he  had  influenced. 
When  he  grew  homesick  for  the  mountains,  his  very 
jealousy  at  the  prospect  of  losing  his  self-control  bade 
the  tears  dry  suddenly  in  his  eyes ;  when  he  found  him- 
self the  prey  of  annoying  doubts  as  to  the  actual  death 
of  his  father  and  sister  at  the  hands  of  the  French  sol- 
diery, his  resolve  to  put  the  past  behind  him,  made  with 
the  fervency  of  young  blood,  stiffened  itself  with  the  jeal- 
ous apprehension  that  he  was  not  the  monarch  of  his 
own  soul,  and  doubt  was  banished.  Nothing  save  this 
jealous  regard  for  his  individual  will  kept  him  often  from 
breaking  down  completely.  Nothing  save  the  jealous 
perception  that  somebody  else  was  likely  to  exercise 
sovereignty  over  the  mind  of  his  royal  friend  Francis, 
could  have  disturbed  the  ardor  of  his  desire  to  study 
with  Nouvisset  at  Chilly.  His  instructor  saw  that  this 
was  the  concealed  fire,  likely  at  any  moment  to  break 
forth  and  consume  any  wise  plans  and  noble  ideas  which 
might  be  his.  Gifted,  supremely  gifted,  with  energies 
which  indicated  greatness  itself,  the  very  qualities  which 
made  him  promising  were  already  unsteady  in  the  pres- 
ence of  this  inbred  passion. 

The  friendship,  nay,  the  devotion  of  Francis  unto  Ami 
was  such  that  he  really  delighted  in  this  unholy  spirit. 
He  was  also  foolish  enough  to  feed  its  flame.  He  had 
gloried  in  its  fury.  He  loved  to  be  loved,  as  he  thought, 
with  an  affectionateness  so  intolerant.  Against  the 
growth  of  such  an  evil  power,  Nouvisset,  on  the  other 


IO2  MONK  AND  KNIGHT. 

hand,  was  sure  to  place  all  wise  opposition.  He  knew 
Ami's  nature  so  thoroughly  that  nothing  but  the  fact  of 
heredity  could  explain  this  most  absurd  flame  so  often 
lighting  up  his  soul,  until  all  its  secret  recesses  were 
revealed.  He  henceforth  at  Chilly,  as  he  told  Margue- 
rite, would  keep  the  fuel  away  from  the  fire,  and  seek 
to  destroy  it  entirely. 

What  made  it  still  more  difficult  to  be  dealt  with  was  the 
grandeur  it  often  assumed  in  its  association  with  a  stal- 
wart and  assertive  conscientiousness,  —  a  conscientious- 
ness which  had  been  bred  into  the  youth  by  generations 
of  ardent  Waldensians.  Nouvisset,  tired  as  he  was  of 
the  falsity  of  the  French  court,  and  entirely  conscious  of 
the  utter  powerlessness  of  the  influence  of  the  Church  to 
control  human  life,  greatly  admired  such  a  conscience, 
standing  in  such  solemn  contrast  as  it  did  with  the 
cant,  sentimentalism,  and  iniquity  about  him.  He  saw 
that  Ami  always  touched  Francis  with  a  moral  power, 
healthful  and  refreshing.  The  youth  was  jealous,  as  it 
often  seemed,  because  of  the  fact  that  he  was  right  and 
others  who  flitted  about  the  young  king  presumptive 
were  wrong. 

One  day  Nouvisset  ventured  to  say  to  Marguerite  :  "  I 
could  not  think  of  attempting  to  dimmish  Ami's  power 
over  our  Due  de  Valois  so  long  as  Francis  has  any  love 
for  the  good  and  true.  It  would  seem  as  though  I 
had  not  a  care  for  good  morals.  Something  must  be 
had  here  in  France  to  keep  things  from  going  to  utter 
destruction ; "  and  then  the  conversation  drifted  into 
statements  and  wonderings  about  the  influence  of  the 
Reformers. 

From  that  moment  Marguerite  herself,  who  had  great 
confidence  in  the  judgment  and  honor  of  Nouvisset, 
was  noticed  to  be  more  tolerant  toward  those  who  in- 
sisted upon  the  necessity  for  reform  within  the  Holy 
Catholic  Church. 


THE  KING   UNDER   GOVERNANCE.  1 03 

At  that  juncture  also  did  Nouvisset,  of  whom  we  know 
too  little,  disclose  some  new  and  many  old  characteristics 
with  which  the  friends  of  Francis,  Due  de  Valois,  would 
become  very  familiar.  He  was  just  such  a  man  as  at 
that  hour  in  the  history  of  France  often  found  his  way 
into  the  army  of  priests  which  thronged  the  cathedrals 
and  monasteries,  the  army  of  soldiers  which  gathered 
about  a  king,  or  the  army  of  those  who  were  either 
affecting  or  realizing  the  scholarly  ideals.  The  name 
Nouvisset  would  denote  a  Frenchman ;  but  this  man 
was  a  Greek,  who  had  changed  his  name,  for  reasons 
which  were  satisfactory  to  him  and  to  his  sovereign. 

Louis  XII.  was  the  first  monarch  to  allow  the  stradiots 
a  place  in  the  French  army.  These  mercenaries  had 
hawked  their  services  about  Europe,  offering  them  for 
sale  to  the  highest  bidder.  The  Turk  was  poor  and 
proud ;  the  Christian  was  needy,  but  also  rich ;  and  the 
papal  legate  at  the  side  of  the  French  king  rejoiced  as 
their  vizorless  helmets  charmed  the  sunbeams,  and  the 
huge  cross-handed  swords  which  they  carried  pledged  a 
new  power  against  the  infidels.  Amongst  them  all,  none 
had  presented  so  fine  an  appearance  as  had  the  merce- 
nary whom  we  shall  know  as  Nouvisset.  He  was  formed 
for  knighthood.  The  cuirass  with  gracefully  flowing 
sleeves,  and  with  the  gauntlets  in  mail,  was  half  concealed 
and  half  revealed  by  a  sort  of  jacket,  which  fitted  with  no 
disadvantage  a  form  of  dignity  and  grace,  in  whose  pres- 
ence the  classical  devices  which  had  been  worked  with 
such  care  and  freedom  on  his  sword,  the  less  beautiful 
small-arms  carried  at  the  saddle-bow,  and  the  long  lance 
appeared  to  connect  the  new  and  barbaric  West  with  the 
ancient  and  cultured  East. 

Nouvisset,  long  years  before,  had  felt  the  raptures 
and  pains  of  love  by  the  blue  ^gean.  He  had  read 
from  Theocritus  to  his  Grecian  damsel  in  vain.  He  had 
told  her  how  Aspasia  must  have  loved  Pericles,  without 


104  MONK  AND  KNIGHT. 

eliciting  a  hint  of  the  energetic  response  he  craved.  On 
the  unfortunate  issue  of  this  affection  he  had  recklessly 
attached  himself  to  a  conscienceless  band  of  hirelings, 
and  being  almost  companionless  —  for  he  was  a  scholar, 
and  of  most  gentle  breeding  —  he  found  himself  at  last 
a  servant  of  Louis  XII.  of  France,  at  wages  which  galled 
his  fine  soul. 

Chance,  however,  very  soon  brought  him  to  the  notice 
of  two  men  with  whose  careers  French  history  has  had 
much  to  do.  He  had  previously  won  the  praise  and 
friendly  association  of  Chevalier  Bayard,  sans  peur  et 
sans  reproche ;  but  on  the  battle-field  of  Ravenna  he 
had  completely  captured  his  heart.  There,  in  those  same 
woods  of  pine,  where  Dante  passed  days  and  nights  in 
repeating  the  growing  verses  of  the  "  Divine  Comedy," 
where  Boccaccio  had  dreamed  of  Honoria,  where  the 
English  Dryden  would  one  day  reinspire  his  genius,  and 
Lord  Byron  would  make  into  song  his  experiences  of 
travel  and  of  love,  —  the  heroic  spirit  of  the  Greek,  who 
never  forgot  the  fact  of  his  extraction  from  the  loins 
of  a  soldier  of  Marathon,  displayed  its  excellent  quality. 
Often  as  the  fearless  Chevalier  told  the  story  of  Nou- 
visset's  courage  and  sympathy  to  the  good  heart  of 
Louis  XII.,  he  would  forget  the  blood-tracked  marsh, 
spreading  far  to  the  white  Alps  and  the  blue  Apennines, 
the  gory  fen  which  rivalled  the  red  afterglow  glaring 
upon  the  summits,  the  golden  lilies  and  pink  tamarisks 
which  were  trodden  down  by  the  corseleted  soldiers, 
the  orchises  whose  purple  splendor  hung  above  the  faces 
of  the  dying,  the  gleaming  marigolds  which  made  a 
flaming  pillow  for  the  dead,  all  the  ardent  valor  which 
marched  through  the  shallow  canal  in  the  very  face  of 
blazing  Spanish  artillery,  even  the  awful  suddenness  of 
silence  which  came  to  the  blaring  trumpets  and  piercing 
clarions  when  the  agonizing  shout  went  up,  "  Gaston 
is  dead  !  "  —  all  these  were  forgotten  as  Bayard  sought 


THE  KING   UNDER   GOVERNANCE.  105 

to   utter  his   feelings   of  admiring  love   for  Nouvisset's 
incredible  effort  to  save  him. 

The  very  soul  of  knighthood  looked  through  the  eyes 
of  the  Greek  mercenary.  "  Sire,  I  thought  I  could  see 
the  ghost  of  his  ancestor  at  his  side  fighting  at  the 
Milvian  Bridge,"  said  the  Chevalier  Bayard,  as  he  told 
the  story  of  Nouvisset  at  Ravenna. 

In  a  controversy  concerning  the  "  Oration  on  the 
Crown,"  which  rose  between  two  men  of  the  court  where 
Nouvisset  was  doing  duty,  something  had  been  said  as 
to  the  patriotism  of  Demosthenes.  French  wit,  spite- 
fully refusing  the  Renaissance,  dared  to  impugn  the  mo- 
tives of  the  great  Greek  orator.  A  poor  and  unlearned 
Greek  stood  by,  silently  wishing  that  his  position  and 
learning  might  justify  his  defending  the  eloquence  of  his 
native  land.  Ignorance  seemed  sure  to  triumph,  whe 
this  stalwart  hireling  Nouvisset,  unable  to  endure  the 
attack  longer,  painted  such  a  picture  of  the  times,  and 
so  justly  rendered  the  burning  words  of  the  eloquent  foe 
of  Philip,  that  the  poet  who  at  that  moment  influenced 
the  intellectual  atmosphere  of  France  most  strongly 
with  his  own  eagerness  for  scholarly  attainment,  leaped 
toward  him  and  embracing  him,  cried  out :  "  'T  is  well. 
I  never  saw  you  before.  I  am  the  master  of  these," 
pointing  to  the  gathered  crowd  of  courtiers.  "  You  are 
mine  !  " 

It  was  the  poet  Clement  Marot,  who  was  to  teach 
Marguerite  d'Angouleme  love  and  rhyming,  and  to  be 
compelled  at  a  later  day  to  withdraw  himself  from 
France,  under  the  complimentary  charge  of  heresy. 

These  two  events  in  the  life  of  Nouvisset  had  given 
him  a  unique  place  at  court. 

Nouvisset,  who  had  mastered  knighthood  and  his  pre- 
cious books,  was  now  feeling  the  burden  of  advancing 
years.  The  wound  received  at  Ravenna,  as  he  sought 
to  save  the  illustrious  Gaston  de  Foix,  had  incapacitated 


IO6  MONK  AND  KNIGHT. 

him  for  any  active  service,  and  commended  him  to  the 
deepest  affections  of  the  king. 

He  had  seen  many  changes  in  France,  but  none  which 
interested  his  hope  more  deeply  than  the  consequences 
which  had  followed  the  setting  up  of  a  printing-press  in 
the  Sorbonne  by  Louis  XII.  in  1469,  and  the  refusal  of 
that  monarch  to  persecute  what  in  England  was  known 
as  "the  new  learning,"  —  none,  except,  perhaps,  the  ob- 
vious growth  of  the  feeling  that  unhappy  France,  through 
the  Church  which  overawed  the  intellectual  and  spiritual 
life  of  Christendom,  was  becoming  barren  of  any  percep- 
tion of  the  radical  difference  between  right  and  wrong, 
and  that  she  was  dimly  searching  after  some  higher  moral 
motive  power.  Of  course,  he  looked  upon  all  moral  and 
mental  phenomena  from  the  point  of  view  of  the  Greek. 
He  had  never  been  won  over  to  the  churchmanship  of 
Louise  of  Savoy,  who  had  often,  amidst  her  shameless 
crimes,  explained  to  him  the  transparent  theory  and  de- 
lightful practice  of  the  "  indulgences."  From  the  igno- 
rance of  the  clergy  he  fled  to  his  Attic  treasures,  to  be 
refreshed  and  fed ;  and  from  the  iniquity  and  religiosity 
of  the  devotees  in  Church  and  State  he  hied  himself  to 
Plato  and  Socrates,  and  there  he  was  reinspired.  They, 
at  least,  were  less  superstitious  and  more  serious.  The 
Greek  concluded  each  day,  with  the  words  of  the  heathen 
moralist :  "  Be  of  good  cheer  about  death,  and  know 
this  of  a  truth,  —  that  no  evil  can  happen  to  a  good 
man,  either  in  life  or  after  death." 

How  could  he  be  true  to  the  ambitious  designs  of 
Louise  of  Savoy  with  respect  to  Ami's  faith  and  Ami's 
influence  upon  her  son  Francis,  and  still  faithful  to  these 
his  own  soul's  best  convictions?  He  seemed  to  foresee 
it  all.  He  made  a  resolve.  Ami  would  certainly  be 
charmed  into  the  deepest  devotion  unto  the  Holy  Catho- 
lic Church.  That  event  no  single  teacher  could  prevent. 
Omnipotence  only  could  oppose  successfully  the  multitu- 


THE  KING   UNDER    GOVERNANCE.  IO/ 

dinous  schemes  which  would  surely  bind  him  to  her 
altars.  But  Nouvisset  knew  that  that  Waldensian  spirit 
which  Ami  breathed  would  by  and  by  assert  its  inwrought 
protest.  Meanwhile  he  would  quietly  sow  those  seeds 
of  philosophy  in  Ami's  mind  which  would  spring  to  life  at 
some  distant  day,  when  the  drops  of  heroic  blood,  which 
must  soon  flow,  began  to  touch  them.  He  would  sow 
the  seed,  and  bide  his  time. 


CHAPTER   IX. 

WITCHES   AND    KNIGHTS. 

"  Cuer  resolu  d'aultre  chose  na  cure 

Que  de  1'honneur, 

Le  corps  vaincu  le  cueur  reste  vaincqueur, 
Le  travail  est  1'estuve  de  son  heur." 

ONE  night,  in  the  home  of  the  peasant  which  Nou- 
visset  had  selected  as  the  place  in  which  he  would 

instruct  and  train  the  chosen  friend  of  the  coming  king, 
Ami  had  quietly  calculated  that  just  five  years  had  gone, 
since  he,  a  struggling  and  terrified  child,  beheld  the  de- 
scent of  the  French  invaders  from  the  monastery  on  the 
hill ;  the  scenes  of  carnage  in  that  humble  cottage  which 
was  burned;  the  staggering  form  of  his  dying  father  hold- 
ing out  his  hacked  wrists,  as  he  piteously  cried,  "  You 
have  killed  my  little  Alke ;  I  am  stricken  to  death  ;  spare 
my  child  Ami,  oh,  spare  him  ! " 

The  mind  of  the  young  man  which  the  patient  Greek 
had  thus  far  so  carefully  educated,  had  long  been  poised 
between  two  thoughts.  One  was,  "  I  love  the  memory 
of  my  father  and  little  Alke."  The  other  was,  "  I  love 
those  who  have  obeyed  the  dying  man's  pleading  cry, 
and  have  opened  my  soul  to  such  a  vast  future."  The 
glamour  of  his  recent  associations  ;  the  fact  that  he  knew 
himself  to  be  influential  with  Prince  Francis  d'Angouleme  ; 
the  recollections  of  his  mother's  ambition  that  he  should 


WITCHES  AND  KNIGHTS  109 

be  a  knight,  and  the  probability  of  its  attainment ;  the 
memory  of  his  father's  hope  that  he  should  be  a  scholar, 
and  the  probability  of  its  realization  also,  —  all  were  in 
league  with  a  certain  powerful  tendency  toward  court-life 
which  he  had  inherited  from  his  Italian  mother,  who,  as 
we  have  seen,  was  a  daughter  of  Count  Neforzo  of  Ven- 
ice. Whatever  might  happen  in  later  days,  when  the 
wild  romanticism  of  youth  had  been  shot  through  with 
the  steady  light  of  conscience,  this  devotion  to  Francis 
was  now  sure  to  furnish  the  aim  and  temper  of  his  young 
manhood. 

Nouvisset  had  been  commanded  to  do  but  one  thing. 
"  Prepare  him  to  be  the  companion  and  friend  of  my 
loving  son,"  said  Louise  of  Savoy,  as  she  gave  up  her 
page,  and  placed  many  bright  coins  in  the  hands  of  the 
lame  knight. 

It  was  a  many-sided  culture  which  Nouvisset  was  able 
to  give  to  Ami  and  his  young  friend  at  Chilly.  Often- 
times to  the  Greek  it  appeared  that  his  charge  had  been 
removed  from  the  superstitions  which  haunt  a  court,  to 
those,  less  magnificent  but  more  intense,  which  beset  a 
peasant's  home. 

While  at  the  castle  Francis  was  explaining  to  his 
mother  the  efforts  of  the  astrologer  who  made  it  clear 
that  Ami  was  to  be  his  good  daemon,  yonder  at  the  house 
in  Chilly  the  following  colloquy  was  going  on  :  — 

"  A  witch  with  a  red  hood  and  golden  toes  must  have 
been  beautiful,"  said  Francesco  de  Robo,  a  young  Italian 
who  had  been  allowed  to  be  a  companion  of  Ami  at 
Chilly  by  Admiral  Andrea  Doria,  an  ally  of  France,  who 
desired  his  promising  protege",  Francesco,  to  be  educated 
also. 

To  him  and  to  Ami  the  peasant's  loquacious  wife  had 
been  relating  her  experience  with  witches. 

"Yes,  all  but  her  ugly  face,"  slowly  answered  she,  as 
she  left  the  large  room  in  which  the  husband  and  she 


IIO  MONK  AND  KNIGHT. 

lived,  and  in  the  evening  shared  with  Nouvisset  and  the 
two  youths.  The  door  squeaked  with  a  ghostly  sound, 
as  she  jerked  and  shut  it. 

They  were  silent  for  some  minutes ;  for  even  then 
witchcraft  had  no  delight  to  imaginative  young  men,  as 
the  evening  darkness  came  on.  Nouvisset  and  the  peas- 
ant had  not  yet  returned  from  the  hunt  for  hares  on 
which  they  had  set  out  many  hours  before.  The  evening 
tasks  had  fallen  to  the  peasant's  wife.  She  had  herself 
gone  out  to  the  first  of  the  three  buildings  which  con- 
stituted the  dwelling  of  a  villein.  It  was  called  the  cow- 
house. The  "  ugly  face  "  which  she  had  just  mentioned 
seemed  to  appear  and  reappear  in  the  crackling  fire, 
which  had  been  made  of  vine  branches  and  fagots,  and 
which  furnished  a  flame  that  surged  up  a  wide  chimney. 
There  were  also  very  strange  noises  on  the  thatched 
roof. 

"  There,  I  see  her  face  just  above  the  iron-pot  hanger  !  " 
whispered  Francesco,  frightened  almost  to  silence. 

Ami,  with  the  cool  rationalism  which  had  made  his 
father  a  heretic  with  respect  to  so  many  other  phantoms, 
leaped  to  the  side  of  the  chimney,  seized  the  heavy 
shovel,  and  smote  vigorously  the  tripod  and  caldron  and 
meat-hook  in  turns,  half  destroying  both  his  weapon 
and  the  good  housekeeper's  utensils. 

"  I  will  damage  her  golden  toes,"  said  the  fearless 
Waldensian. 

"  And  the  very  Devil  will  drag  us  both  into  hell,  if  you 
don't  stop  !  "  cried  Francesco,  with  a  shudder.  "  Stop,  I 
beg  you  !  Do  not  fight  against  a  witch." 

Even  Ami  wished  the  peasant's  wife  had  not  left  them 
alone ;  for  he  certainly  saw  a  face  just  then  in  a  curling 
flame,  and  he  heard  a  sound  from  above  him  which 
made  him  tremble.  He  felt  cold,  and  yet  he  did  not 
go  near  the  fire.  He  walked  over  to  the  table,  instead, 
on  which  stood  a  kneading-trough  and  a  bit  of  cheese. 


WITCHES  AND  KNIGHTS.  Ill 

There  had  been  two  pieces  of  cheese  on  that  same  table 
but  a  few  minutes  before. 

"  Francesco,  did  you  eat  the  other  bit  of  cheese?  " 

"  No ;  nor  did  she,  for  she  likes  it  not,"  replied  the 
Italian,  with  interesting  precipitation. 

"  What  became  of  it,  then?  " 

"  I  cannot  tell.  Ami,  I  wish  I  was  back  in  a  strong 
castle,  where  I  could  bar  the  door  and  call  the  soldiers. 
That  witch  with  the  ugly  face  has  taken  the  cheese." 

"  It  would  do  no  good,  if  we  could  bar  a  door  of  steel. 
Witches  like  to  come  through  impossible  barriers,  don't 
they?  Do  they  eat  cheese,  Francesco?  " 

"  Yes,  I  suppose  so ;  but  I  never  saw  a  witch  where 
there  was  not  some  sickly  woman  about.  Why  did  Nou- 
visset  bring  us  here?  Oh,  witches  !  They  don't  infest 
the  ships  of  Admiral  Andrea  Doria.  The  peasant's  wife 
never  sees  a  witch  when  the  peasant  himself  and  Nou- 
visset  are  here." 

"  But  the  duke  —  even  Francis  d'Angouleme  has  seen 
them.  I  waited  with  him  for  a  whole  night,  to  see  one 
who  had  come  to  his  mother.  She  looked  fierce  enough, 
with  a  hook  on  her  ear,  and  she  had  a  head  of  fire.  The 
Duke  Francis  wanted  her  to  come  —  I  mean  he  wanted 
the  witch  to  come.  He  was  sure  she  would  return,  and 
tell  him  of  the  death  of  the  king." 

Ami  was  fast  losing  his  rationalistic  temper,  as  the  lit- 
tle gimlet,  which  lay  near  the  elbow  of  Francesco,  was 
pushed  off  the  table  and  fell  upon  the  hand-mill  in 
which  the  peasant's  wife  was  about  to  grind  the  corn 
which  she  had  now  gone  to  fetch.  The  shock  seemed 
to  fill  the  huge  fireplace  with  ugly  faces.  Ami  prepared 
himself  to  fence.  Knighthood,  however,  never  seemed 
so  futile  and  unimpressive. 

Francesco  pushed  himself  backward  among  the  bas- 
kets, which  behaved  under  his  feet  as  if  they  were  alive  ; 
and  suddenly  feeling  a  twinge  of  pain,  he  cried  out,  — 


112  MONK  AND  KNTGHT. 

"  This  is  an  infernal  place  !  Ami,  a  witch  has  pinched 
me,  or  pricked  me  with  her  needle.  I  know  what  I 
feel  in  my  own  flesh.  Don't  strike  at  another  witch  !  " 
he  added,  as  he  saw  the  knightly  Ami  approach,  bran- 
dishing a  small  jug,  instead  of  a  sword,  in  his  sinewy 
hand. 

"  Come  away  from  that  dark  corner !  "  commanded 
Ami,  still  belligerent. 

Francesco  started  to  obey,  and  cried  out  again,  "  She 
has  pinched  me  !  " 

"  Jump  out  of  the  way  of  her  !  "  said  Ami. 

"  Oh,  my  arm  is  held  fast  by  the  hideous  teeth  of  a 
veritable  witch  !  "  yelled  Francesco. 

Ami  knew  that  his  friend  was  in  great  pain ;  but  he 
was  afraid  to  strike  or  to  seek  to  relieve  him.  Nouvisset 
had  never  told  him  what  a  knight  should  do  under  such 
circumstances.  Ami  called  lustily  for  the  peasant's  wife, 
who  from  the  cow-house  informed  him  that  she  was 
performing  what  seems  to  the  reader  a  very  modern 
thing,  —  setting  a  trap  for  mice  and  using  a  bit  of  cheese 
for  bait. 

"  There  !  that  cheese  is  in  the  trap ;  there  are  no 
witches  here,"  said  he. 

In  an  angry  voice  Francesco  replied  :  "  Am  I  a  knave 
or  a  fool,  that  you  disbelieve  me  ?  My  aching  arm  is  yet 
held  fast  by  her  fierce  tooth.  You  need  not  help  me, 
but  you  must  not  doubt  me." 

Boldly  —  for  his  knightly  honor  had  suffered  —  did  the 
Waldensian  now  take  hold  of  the  suffering  Francesco. 
The  Italian  was  leaning  forward  as  he  had  been  since  he 
felt  the  pain,  both  hands  grasping  the  table  as  though,  if 
he  lost  his  hold  upon  that  fact  of  this  world,  he  would 
fall  into  purgatory.  His  forehead  was  studded  with  cold 
sweat-drops,  when  Ami  found  a  small  line  which  seemed 
to  bind  his  friend  fast  to  the  skin  blouse  whose  leathern 
belt  dangled,  as  Francesco  swayed  backward  and  forward. 


WITCHES  AND  KNIGHTS.  113 

and  pulled  it  far  out  from  the  hook  on  which  the  peas- 
ant had  hung  it. 

"  This  —  is  —  a  —  fish-line  !  "  said  the  breathless  Ami, 
with  mingled  terror  and  disgust. 

"Am  I  a  fool  or  a  knave?"  thundered  Francesco, 
with  his  voice  full  of  agony. 

"  Well,  neither,"  replied  his  friend,  with  the  speed  of 
gradual  discovery;  "but  you  have  one  of  the  peasant's 
fish-hooks  in  your  arm,  as  sure  as  you  are  alive." 

"The  witch  put  it  there  ;  she  did  !  "  said  the  Italian, 
more  disgusted  still,  because  he  had  been  so  victimized. 
"  The  miserable  witch  did  it.  Do  you  hear  her  now 
scampering  off  on  the  roof?  " 

The  friends  sat  down  by  the  huge  fireplace.  Ami 
needed  not  the  knife,  which  he  had  just  drawn  from  the 
sheath  which  had  been  hanging  from  the  belt  of  the 
peasant's  coat.  He  did  need  a  great  deal  of  forced 
solemnity,  however,  as  he  listened  to  Francesco,  who 
possessed  not  a  grain  of  humor,  who  never  doubted  the 
existence  of  variously  organized  supernatural  beings, 
least  of  all,  that  of  witches,  and  who  had  begun  to  tell 
Ami  about  the  witches  of  Italy  when  Nouvisset  and  the 
peasant  returned  from  the  hunt. 

"  You  are  both  as  pale  as  ghosts,"  said  the  Greek,  as 
they  rose  to  greet  him  and  to  relieve  the  weary  arms  of 
the  lame  knight  of  the  burden  of  two  fat  hares. 

"Well,  we  have  seen  strange  things,"  said  Francesco. 

"  And  felt  some  of  them  too,"  added  Ami. 

"  Did  you  see  the  wild-cats  chasing  over  the  roof? " 
said  Nouvisset. 

"  No  !  "  answered  both,  believing  for  the  instant  that 
truth  is  stranger  than  fiction. 

"Did  you  hear  the  unchivalrous   peasant  laugh  and 

poke  his  rough  fun  at  his  wife,  caught  out  there  in  his 

mouse-trap  as  she  was,  and  too  much  annoyed  at  being 

caught  to  ask  a  young  knight  to  extricate  her  fingers?" 

VOL.  i.  —  8 


114  MONK  AND  KNIGHT. 

Nouvisset  could  not  but  laugh,  as  he  related  the  tale 
of  her  woes.  "  She  has  been  entrapped  this  long  while. 
The  rats  will  flee  the  premises,  if  they  hear  the  peasant 
laugh  and  hear  her  scold  him.  She  blamed  the  trap  and 
the  cheese ;  and  she  blamed  the  young  knights,  who, 
she  says,  made  a  great  howl  in  the  house  here,  and  then 
called  out  at  her.  She  is  full  of  wrath." 

Even  Francesco  smiled  at  this,  and  desired  to  give  the 
conversation  a  new  turn. 

"There  are  too  many  men  present  here  now,  for 
any  witch  to  come  to  this  house  to-night,"  said  Ami, 
quietly. 

Francesco  gave  his  companion  to  understand  that  any 
further  information  concerning  the  fright,  granted  to 
Nouvisset  or  to  the  household,  would  offend  his  dignity; 
and  while  Ami  was  silent,  but  pained  at  having  to  remain 
so,  the  lame  Greek  explained  to  them,  as  he  had  often 
done,  the  .advantages  he  had  sought  to  offer  them  at 
Chilly.  He  told  them  again  of  Socrates  and  his  disci- 
ples., how  impossible  it  was  to  do  anything  at  any 
court  for  them,  and  of  the  desire  of  their  best  friends 
that  they  should  know  the  country  as  they  knew  their 
books.  He  concluded  by  remarking :  "  Wisdom  does 
not  live  in  castles;  the  chivalry  of  ideas  avoids  the 
capitals;" 

While  the  discipline  of  Nouvisset  was  vigorous  and  un- 
yielding, both  Ami  and  Francesco  indulged  themselves 
often  in  good-humored  raillery  as  to  their  conduct  as 
young  aspirants  for  knighthood,  and  as  students  who 
took  on  trust  their  changed  circumstances. 

Here,  at  Chilly,  was  no  Louise  of  Savoy,  whose  wines 
Ami  was  to  pour  out,  whose  cooked  hares  he  might 
carve,  whose  letters  he  might  write  and  carry  to  Duprat 
or  the  Due  de  Bourbon ;  but  so  eagerly  did  he  seize  the 
great  idea  of  respect  for  womankind  which  inspired 
chivalry,  that  the  neophyte  having  astonished  Nouvisset 


WITCHES  AND  KNIGHTS.  115 

by  his  choice  of  a  rather  loquacious  egg- seller  in  Chilly, 
as  his  lady  whom  he  would  serve,  lavished  upon  this 
quaintest  of  peasantwomen  a  thoroughly  chivalrous  de- 
votion, as  he  recounted  to  her  his  imagined  deeds  of 
valor.  Nouvisset  was  not  altogether  unwilling  to  see 
this,  inasmuch  as  he  had  often  said  to  them :  "  The 
peasantwoman  of  unhappy  France  needs  a  knightly 
protector.  True  knighthood  seeks  the  weakest,  not  the 
strongest,  that  it  may  be  truly  chivalric." 

With  no  little  amazement  did  Francesco,  who  was 
proud  of  his  Italian  relationship,  behold  his  friend  Ami 
on  one  Good  Friday,  carrying  for  the  woman,  to  the 
priests,  a  basket  of  eggs  which  had  been  duly  boiled  in 
a  madder  bath,  wjiich  now  only  needed  the  blessing  to  fit 
them  for  the  already  strained  appetites  which  had  waited 
to  enjoy  them  on  Easter  Sunday. 

Practising  at  wielding  the  sword,  they  grew  strong  in 
muscular  development,  and  soon  the  lances  were  bran- 
dished with  graceful  ease.  Combats  were  arranged  and 
duels  fought,  while  Nouvisset  sat  robed  in  august  dignity. 
The  peasant  and  his  wife  were  amused ;  and  the  talka- 
tive egg- seller,  pausing  with  her  stick,  from  whose  ex- 
tremities dangled  two  filled  baskets,  laughed  heartily,  and 
always  urged  Ami  to  some  braver  task. 

"  You  will  be  made  an  esquire,  surely ;  you  are  a  fit 
one  for  a  queen,"  she  cried  out. 

Before  the  door  of  the  peasant's  home,  Nouvisset  had 
set  up  the  revolving  image  of  a  knight ;  and  often 
through  the  morning  many  of  the  Parisian  chivalry  who 
had  been  invited  by  Francis  himself  to  pass  a  day  at 
Chilly,  observed  the  youths  playing  at  the  game  of  quin- 
tain. Ami  was  ever  the  favorite  in  the  saddle.  His 
good  temper,  his  unfailing  wisdom,  communicated  them- 
selves to  the  steed ;  and  until  jealousy  of  another's  in- 
fluence over  the  good-will  of  the  Duke  Francis  appeared, 
he  managed  shield,  lance,  and  charger  with  complete 


Il6  MONK  AND  KNIGHT. 

dexterity.  Gauntlet,  sword,  and  cuirass  always  came 
into  awkward  and  ungainly  positions,  —  his  very  vision  of 
the  desired  accolade  faded  from  view,  —  when  this  abom- 
inable passion  was  roused. 

It  had  been  the  effort  of  Nouvisset  to  quench  it,  if  pos- 
sible ;  and  therefore  Prince  Francis  had  not  often  visited 
Chilly.  Francesco  was  sure  to  be  more  successful  in  any 
sort  of  tournament  on  those  occasions,  and  the  result  of 
a  month's  labor  with  Ami  was  destroyed. 

As  the  days  came  and  went,  obvious  progress  was 
made.  The  youths  praised  the  already  celebrated  white 
bread  of  Chilly.  Anything  was  preferable,  in  Ami's  expe- 
rience, to  eating  luxuries  with  Louise  of  Savoy.  Ami 
praised  the  oil  which  grew  rancid  before  Lent  was 
passed,  though  Francesco  suggested  obtaining  a  dis- 
pensation from  the  Pope  which  would  enable  them  to 
eat  butter. 

Ami  even  rationalistically  reflected  upon  the  situation, 
when  the  egg-seller  trudged  along  through  Lent,  unable 
to  get  a  living,  — 

"  Now  the  theologians  teach  that  the  hen  is  a  water 
animal.  The  hymn  in  the  service  implies  that  fish  and 
fowl  were  made  at  the  same  time.  You  ought  to  sell  us 
eggs  with  the  fish." 

She  answered  him  by  saying :  "  There  is  much  vile 
heresy  in  the  world.  Do  you  think  I  would  lose  my 
soul,  you  varlet?  " 

It  was  difficult  often  for  the  Waldensian  to  overcome 
his  inbred  heretical  disposition  on  fast  days.  The  peas- 
ant was  an  artist  at  fattening  a  poularde.  Ami  had  been 
instructed  to  believe  that  Louis  XII.  had  agreed  with  the 
Duke  Francis  that  they  should  lack  nothing  at  Chilly  to 
make  them  comfortable.  Lent  was  a  fearful  trial.  As 
Ami  looked  upon  the  flock  of  geese  which  the  pious 
peasant  drove  to  the  field  to  feed  every  day,  his  sinewy 
youth  remembered  the  current  saying :  "  Who  eats  the 


WITCHES  AND  KNIGHTS.  117 

king's  goose  returns  his  feathers  in  a  hundred  years." 
He  became  desperately  weary  of  the  whole  Catholic 
regimen ;  and  Nouvisset  was  not  concerned  that  the  or- 
thodoxy of  the  time  grew  distasteful  to  him. 

"  Make  him  a  knight  and  a  scholar  !  "  —  this  demand 
of  Louise  of  Savoy  was  given  a  barely  literal  interpreta- 
tion. "  Some  one  else,"  said  he,  "  must  furnish  his  theo- 
logical culture.  I  hope  it  will  be  Berquin,  Lefevre,  or 
Farel."  The  thought  that  the  already  suspected  Lefevre 
or  the  young  William  Farel,  especially  that  Louis  de 
Berquin,  should  get  hold  of  this  youth,  was  itself  a  prom- 
ise that  the  Church  would  not  quench  the  better  lights 
of  his  mind  and  moral  sense. 

After  many  months  of  training,  the  day  at  length  came 
nigh  for  that  religious  ceremony  which  was  to  mark  a 
changed  social  condition.  Francesco  and  Ami  were  to 
see  their  arms  hallowed.  Their  knightly  calling  was  to 
be  made  sacred.  Cased  in  armor  of  the  most  brilliant 
sort,  the  gifts  of  the  duke  and  Andrea  Doria  to  their 
proteges,  they  had  mounted  the  two  excellent  chargers 
which  were  to  carry  them  to  the  Cathedral  of  Notre 
Dame. 

"  It  is  too  heavy ;  I  '11  fall  and  kill  them  all,  —  all  my 
hens,  Holy  Mother  !  " 

"  Go  on,  heretic  !  go  on  !  Get  up,  sinner  !  go,  and 
do  penance  afterward  !  " 

The  noisy  voices  of  the  priest  of  Chilly  and  the  egg- 
seller  mingled  their  discordant  tones. 

"'I  did  not  eat  eggs  myself,"  cried  the  egg-seller. 

"  I  did  see  the  shells  of  eggs  at  your  own  door.  Will 
you  —  dare  you  lie  to  a  priest?"  yelled  the  ecclesiastic, 
who  lifted  his  heavy  cane  above  her. 

"  I  cooked  the  eggs  for  the  young  knight.  He  told 
me  that  hens  and  fish  came  on  one  day,  just  alike.  The 
teachers  said  so." 

Ami  saw  it  all  in  an  instant.     The  faithful  old  egg- 


Il8  MONK  AND  KNIGH7\ 

seller  had  believed  the  faithless  youth.  She  was  sure 
that  he  could  not  lie  to  her.  Loving  him,  as  she  did, 
pitying  the  hunger  of  so  beautiful  a  youth,  she  had  dared 
to  prepare  him  some  eggs,  —  that  was  her  sin.  Of  course 
the  shells  proved  the  indictment.  She  had  been  eating 
eggs  in  Lent !  She  must  be  punished.  Here  she  came. 
All  her  sinful  hens  which  had  ventured  to  lay  eggs  in 
Lenten  season  were  tied  together  by  the  same  great 
flaxen  cord ;  and  they  were  cackling  their  protest  against 
being  thus  wrapped  about  her  neck,  like  a  living  rope  of 
flesh  and  feathers  which  also  covered  her  shoulders  and 
fell  upon  the  ground.  The  priest  came  after  her,  making 
her  suffer  this  public  punishment,  in  addition  to  the  labor 
which  the  task  involved,  to  which  she  was  evidently 
unequal. 

As  the  condemned  woman  came  near,  Ami  recognized 
her.  He  leaped  from  his  horse.  There  was  a  sudden 
stopping  of  the  flash  of  steel,  as  it  flamed  through  the 
air ;  then  a  howling  priest  tumbled  into  a  ravine  near  the 
roadway;  and  Ami,  with  knightly  grace,  cut  the  cord 
with  his  sword. 

"  Oh,  my  hens  !  Catch  my  hens,  my  Lord,  my  Knight ! " 
cried  the  liberated  egg-vender,  as  her  poultry  ran  away 
with  a  rapidity  suggestive  of  the  unpleasant  bondage 
from  which  they  had  been  freed. 

"  Mount  your  charger  !  "  commanded  the  lame  knight. 

Ami  obeyed ;  and  as  they  silently  rode  toward  Paris, 
even  Francesco  laughed  when  Ami  plucked  an  ordinary 
chicken-feather  from  his  spur,  and  said,  to  the  great 
amusement  of  Nouvisset,  — 

"  This  feather  would  make  a  fine  plume  for  a  knight. 
Knighthood  seeks  the  weakest,  not  the  strongest." 

As  they  journeyed  along,  Nouvisset  rehearsed  to  them 
the  meaning  and  value  of  the  various  exercises  he  had 
given  them.  He  did  not  belie  his  pride  in  these  his 
companions,  as  he  spoke  of  the  fact  that  they  had  not 


WITCHES  AND  KNIGHTS.  IIQ 

been  compelled  to  serve  a  seignorial  household,  and  that 
this  private  school  of  chivalry  was  not  inferior.  They 
were  quite  able  to  dictate  etiquette  in  any  master's  court. 
Their  manners  he  knew  to  be  as  refined  as  their  bodies 
were  agile  and  strong.  Energetic,  bold,  versatile,  they 
were  also  scholarly  and  pure.  Everything,  save  Ami's 
one  desperate  passion,  had  been  conquered  as  easily  as 
the  lame  knight  broke  a  charger.  Faithful  were  they  to 
duty,  as  sentries  or  gentlemen.  The  eye  of  Ami  was  es- 
pecially quick,  and  its  vision  comprehensive.  No  master 
on  a  field  of  conflict  need  ever  wait  too  long  for  his 
valiant  assistance.  True,  they  had  not  stopped  in  the 
intermediate  rank.  Neither  had  either  of  them  been 
pursuivant-at-arms.  But  distinguished  knights  had  prac- 
tised before  them ;  they  had  attended  loftily  descended 
ladies,  who  had  visited  Chilly,  and  they  had  visited  other 
lands  in  books. 

Even  now  they  expected  to  be  honored  in  the  cere- 
mony by  Bayard  himself,  and  to  visit  other  countries 
with  the  king  or  with  Admiral  Andrea  Doria.  Scarfs 
embroidered  by  Marguerite,  perfumes  from  Genoa  and 
Naples,  spotless  garments  selected  by  Louise  of  Savoy, 
awaited  them.  They  grew  impatient  as  they  talked 
together. 

Three  nights  constituted  their  prayerful  vigil  in  the 
chapel  of  the  king,  who  graciously  received  them  with 
the  Prince  Francis.  Masses  were  at  length  said  for 
them,  as  on  bended  knees  they  worshipped,  each  hav- 
ing his  sword  fastened  to  his  neck  preparatory  to  the 
moment  when  it  should  be  girded  to  his  side.  At  a 
dramatic  instant  Louise  of  Savoy,  whom  he  hated, 
approached  Ami,  who  however  honored  every  woman ; 
and  the  duke's  mother  handed  him  his  helmet  and 
spurs. 

She  repeated  the  words  :  "  These  two  spurs  of  gold  are 
to  compel  your  horse  onward.  Emulate  his  eagerness, 


I2O 


MONK  AND  KNIGHT. 


and  imitate  his  docility.     Obey  the  Lord,  as  the  charger 
obeys  you." 

At  the  conclusion  of  the  words  Chevalier  Bayard,  sans 
peur  et  sans  reproche,  clad  in  gorgeous  armor,  smote  him 
with  the  sword.  The  accolade  was  soon  in  his  hands. 
Lance  and  shield  were  presented;  and  Ami  Perrin 
walked  forth  to  mount  his  charger  —  a  knight. 


CHAPTER  X. 

A   YOUNG   SCHOLAR   AND   A   YOUNG   KING. 
"  Nutrisco  et  Extinguo." 

JANUARY  ist  had  come.  The  device  of  the  salaman- 
der in  the  fire,  and  the  baleful  motto  printed  at  the 
head  of  this  chapter  had  taken  their  places  in  the  armo- 
rial annals  of  France. 

"  Frenchmen,  we  declare  unto  you  the  most  fatal 
news  you  ever  heard.  The  good  King  Louis,  the  father 
of  his  people,  is  dead  !  Pray  to  God  for  the  repose  of 
his  soul !  "  Thus  cried  the  watchmen  of  Paris. 

"  My  son  is  king  !  What  a  recompense  for  all  the  trials 
and  adversities  of  my  youth  ! "  Thus  exclaimed,  with 
transports  of  joy,  Louise  of  Savoy. 

Ami  was  now  with  Nouvisset  and  Francesco  at  the 
capital.  He  heard  both  remarks. 

"This  is  a  strange  land,"  said  he,  with  deliberate 
thoughtfulness ;  and  checking  himself,  he  added,  "  But 
I  love  my  king  and  friend." 

"  I  also  loved  his  Majesty  Louis  XII.,"  solemnly  re- 
plied his  instructor. 

"  That  no  one  can  doubt !  "  and  Ami  asked  in  a 
breath,  "  Should  love  for  the  dead  keep  back  devotion 
to  the  living?"  Then  he  said  with  pathos,  "I  had  a 


122  MONK  AND  KNIGHT. 

father  whom  I  loved ;  and  he  taught  me  to  love  a  cause 
also." 

Nouvisset  would  have  given  worlds  to  tell  him  that 
neither  his  father  nor  his  father's  cause  was  dead ;  but 
Francis  was  now  King  of  France. 

One  thing  in  the  rush  of  emotions  and  ideas  he  would 
tell  him :  "  The  King  Louis  XII.  was  good,  and  often 
was  wise.  It  was  his  Majesty  —  whose  coffin  will  lie  by 
the  side  of  that  of  Anne  of  Brittany,  his  true  spouse  — 
who  said  of  the  new  king  —  Long  live  the  king  !  — 
Ami ! " 

"  He  did  not  say,  '  Long  live  the  king ! '  I  cannot 
believe  it." 

"No  !  "  answered  the  embarrassed  Nouvisset,  "/  said 
it,  — '  Long  live  the  king  ! '  " 

"  But  what  of  Louis  XII.  ?  " 

"  He  said,  '  Francis,  I  am  dying  !  I  consign  our  sub- 
jects to  your  care.'  " 

Ami  was  a  little  surprised  that  Nouvisset  should  have 
seemed  at  all  hesitant  about  repeating  such  affectionate 
sentences  as  these.  Nouvisset  was  relieved  that  he  had 
succeeded  in  keeping  back  what  might  have  made  him 
seem  untrue  to  the  new  king.  But  what  the  lame  knight 
really  meant  to  say  was  that  Louis  XII.  once  remarked, 
quite  truthfully  as  it  appeared  to  him,  "  We  are  laboring 
in  vain;  this  big  boy  will  spoil  everything  for  us." 

The  young  knight  straightened  himself,  and  simply  ut- 
tered these  words  :  "  I  am  the  loyal  subject  of  Francis  L, 
King  of  France,  and  —  " 

"And  your  own  conscience,"  interrupted  the  lame 
soldier. 

Ami  was  silent  and  thoughtful. 

Nouvisset  knew  at  this  hour  what  a  conscience  might 
mean  to  a  soul  loyally  devoted  to  the  new  king.  Every 
touch  from  Plato  and  Aristotle  which  had  been  transmit- 
ted through  the  words  of  his  proud  and  wise  instructor, 


A    YOUNG  SCHOLAR  AND  A    YOUNG  KING.     123 

had  emphasized  the  rights  and  privileges  of  the  moral 
power  in  Ami.  Every  energy  which  had  moulded  and 
tempered  the  will  of  Francis  I.  had  tended  to  make  him 
scornful  of  these  high  behests. 

Supremely  devoted  to  him  in  passionate  love,  invested 
with  a  dim  consciousness  that  his  own  sacred  place  in 
God's  world  was  by  the  side  of  the  gracious  Due  de  Va- 
lois,  who  had  now  become  sovereign,  Ami's  mind  was 
not  so  dazzled  by  the  glitter  of  royalty,  nor  was  his  rea- 
son so  enslaved  by  his  ambition  to  excel,  as  a  courtly 
knight  and  scholar,  that  he  did  not  feel  the  baneful  influ- 
ence upon  the  new  king's  arrogant  and  susceptible  spirit, 
exercised  through  years  of  association  with  falsity,  in- 
trigue, and  crime.  He  was  reasonably  charitable. 

Perhaps  the  early  recognition  of  the  character  of  the 
duke's  environment  would  keep  Ami  patient  when  others 
grew  resentful.  It  would  help  him  to  cling  to  the  king 
when  even  Marguerite,  his  brilliant  sister,  who  always 
seemed  to  have  had  at  least  the  amateur's  love  for  high 
character  and  good  morals,  would  surrender  to  a  nature 
which  seemed  certain  to  love  and  do  the  wrong. 

In  a  burst  of  charitable  loyalty  to  his  new  sovereign, 
Nouvisset  begged  Ami  never  to  yield  his  conviction  of 
the  right,  or,  on  the  other  hand,  to  expect  a  man  with 
such  culture  as  was  that  of  Francis  I.  to  adopt  a 
theory  of  right  and  wrong  such  as  Ami  himself  had  in- 
breathed and  assimilated  in  the  mountains  with  puritanical 
Waldensians. 

"  You  are  to  pass  from  my  care  into  the  task  of  caring 
for  one  whom  you  love." 

"  He  has  cared  for  me,"  said  Ami,  a  little  weary  of 
Nouvisset's  implied  criticism  of  the  character  of  the 
young  sovereign. 

"  What  said  Socrates  ?  '  You  can  bury  me  if  you  catch 
me  !  '  He  knew  that  the  '  I  '  or  <  me  '  is  the  soul,  Ami. 
When  did  Francis  care  for  your  soul?" 


124  MONK  AND  KNIGHT. 

"When  he  loved  me,"  was  the  intense  reply. 

Nouvisset  knew  that  even  the  philosophy  which  he 
saw  Ami  had  believed,  would  have  no  chance  just  then 
against  such  an  all-absorbing  love.  He  only  trembled 
when  he  thought  how  jealous  Ami  would  certainly  be- 
come if  the  king  should  some  day  fall  in  love  with  some 
one  else  and  cease  to  think  of  him.  He  thought  also 
how  difficult  it  would  be  for  Ami,  with  the  freedom  which 
was  exercised  by  loving  and  beloved  ones  in  France,  to 
have  a  love  affair  of  his  own.  He  dreaded  the  invasion 
which  jealousy  might  make  upon  his  bright  future. 

On  these  points,  however,  he  said  nothing,  but  con- 
tinued to  moralize  in  this  way :  "  You  must  be  a  light 
of  heaven  in  a  dark  vale  of  earth.  The  king  has  had  an 
unfortunate  education  in  morals." 

"  He  is  a  child  of  the  Holy  Church,"  said  Ami. 
"  Bishops  and  Popes  will  be  his  friends." 

Nouvisset  was  not  at  all  astonished  that  so  soon  the  charm 
of  the  Church  had  bewildered  the  brain  of  the  orphan. 
It  had  come  at  last.  Nouvisset  had  resolved  upon  his 
course.  He  would  not  disturb  the  illusion.  He  could 
wait.  By  and  by  the  seeds  in  Ami's  life  and  thought 
would  sprout ;  and  the  awful  weight  would  lift  above 
them,  then  totter,  then  fall. 

"  The  king  has  known  nothing  but  ambition,  supersti- 
tion, and  greed.  He  has  a  great  heart  and  a  clear  head, 
but  his  culture  has  enfeebled  his  will  and  moral  sense. 
Who  loves  Louise  of  Savoy?" 

"  Yet  any  true  knight  will  honor  her  name,"  was  the 
instant  reply  of  her  former  page. 

"  Ah,  yes,"  said  the  lame  knight,  a  little  surprised  that 
while  Ami  had  so  readily  comprehended  the  secret  of 
knighthood,  he  would  not  now  acknowledge  the  com- 
mand of  the  truer  knighthood  whose  day  seemed  just 
before  their  feet.  "  Ah,  yes  !  I  am  proud  of  that  an- 
swer, and  I  am  glad  that  you  have  made  it;  but  you 


A    YOUNG  SCHOLAR  AND  A    YOUNG  KING.      12$ 

admire  her  not.  Who  can  admire  her?  She  rejoiced 
that  he  who  dressed  the  wounds  of  Chevalier  Bayard's 
horse  at  Ravenna  had  left  a  dying  soldier  before  the 
tent.  No  true  knight  can  love  one  who  adores  such 
neglect.  She  has  made  for  the  throne  of  Francis  only 
a  spoiled  boy." 

Nouvisset  had  calculated  not  unwisely  upon  Ami's 
reverence  for  facts,  when  his  jealousy  did  not  consume 
them. 

"  Do  you  know,"  said  Ami,  his  whole  temper  hav- 
ing changed  suddenly.  "  what  Madame  d'Angouleme 
asked  me  to  record  in  her  journal  for  the  day  on 
which  her  son  —  and  I  love  him  !  —  escaped  the  run- 
away horse?  " 

Ami  repeated  with  a  smile  that  well  known  page  of 
Louise's  diary.  Historians  quote  it  as  follows  :  "  The 
25th  of  January,  1501,  Feast  of  the  conversion  of  Saint 
Paul.  At  two  o'clock  p.  M.  my  son's  horse  ran  away  with 
my  King,  my  Lord,  my  Caesar,  right  across  the  fields 
near  Amboise." 

"  No  Greek  mother  ever  made  a  Spartan  soldier  with 
such  senseless  vaporings,"  said  the  aged  son  of  Hellas. 
"  Flattery  is  not  so  fatal  as  falsity,  however.  The  king's 
teachers  have  been  false." 

"  But  was  not  Artus  Gouffier,  Sire  de  Boisy,  a  true 
knight?" 

"  True  knighthood  for  times  like  these,"  said  the  wise 
Nouvisset,  testily,  "  I  have  often  taught  you  to  believe, 
has  more  serious  studies  than  even  our  knightly  Chevalier 
Bayard  attempts.  We  are  at  the  opening  of  a  mighty 
epoch.  The  young  king  knows  the  use  of  arms,  but  not 
the  use  of  ideas.  He  has  been  with  men  who  blaspheme 
and  stake  their  souls  on  a  throw  of  dice.  They  have 
taught  him  that  the  lower  orders,  such  as  you  saw  at 
Chilly,  have  no  rights ;  but  the  true  king  will  not  bully 
the  people.  Ami,  I  determined  to  educate  you,  if  I 


126  MONK  AND  KNIGHT. 

might,  amid  the  classes  of  which  the  court  of  France  is 
ignorant.  Gouffier  of  Portou  knew  not  the  task  of  gov- 
ernment which  lies  before  the  duke.  He  could  fit  our 
sovereign  to  reign  at  a  banquet  or  at  a  tournament,  or  to 
talk  for  a  brief  time  as  if  he  really  possessed  learning." 

"  'T  were  well  if  Francis  had  the  learning  of  his  lovely 
sister,"  remarked  Ami,  a  little  puzzled  to  know  what 
Nouvisset  thought  of  a  woman  whom  he  had  then  dared 
to  call  lovely. 

"  'T  were  better  if  he  had  been  left  undemoralized  by 
her  worship  of  him." 

"  Yes,  truly,"  said  the  youth,  his  cheek  aglow,  utterly 
unconscious  of  the  flame  of  jealousy  which  then  burned 
within  him. 

The  knight  was  pleased  at  the  discovery  which  was 
made.  He  had  trembled  for  the  fate  of  these  two  sus- 
ceptible hearts,  as  Ami  and  Marguerite  d'Angouleme  had 
sat  together  poring  over  a  manuscript  or  talking  of  the 
Trojan  War.  Even  Louise  of  Savoy  had  been  anxious. 
The  old  knight's  difficulties  entirely  cleared  away  when 
he  comprehended  the  fact  that  Ami  had  already  become 
envious  of  her  rivalry  of  love,  perhaps  of  influence. 

Nouvisset  wanted  to  say  something  about  a  character 
so  inconsistent  as  was  hers,  —  a  soul  addicted  even  then 
to  writing  religious  hymns  and  helping  a  dissolute  brother 
out  of  the  difficulties  consequent  upon  his  evil  ways. 
But  he  had  resolved  not  to  touch  any  of  that  multitude 
of  fasting  saints  and  mitred  sinners,  or  even  Marguerite 
d'Angouleme,  of  whom  Ami  was  both  so  fond  and  so 
jealous. 

Nouvisset's  talk  rambled  on,  as  the  spirits  of  Ami,  who 
had  begun  a  little  to  enjoy  the  wild  optimism  which 
ruled  amidst  the  carousals,  turmoils,  and  indifference  of 
that  heyday  time  sensibly  cooled,  bringing  upon  his  soul 
again  the  sense  of  the  imperious  importance  of  every 
life,  even  that  of  his  own,  —  a  consciousness  such  as  he 


A    YOUNG  SCHOLAR  AND  A    YOUNG  KING.      12 7 

dimly  remembered  possessed  the  soul  of  his  father.  In 
fancy  the  youth  once  more  stood  by  his  father's  side,  and 
heard  his  deep,  noble  words.  He  felt  the  contrast  more 
vividly  than  before,  and  began  to  wonder  how  Francis  I. 
should  ever  be  able  to  rule  France.  The  lights  were 
dim ;  and  silently,  as  the  lame  knight  fell  asleep,  the 
youth  sitting  near  pondered. 

A  youth  at  that  hour  amid  those  surroundings  could 
not  have  felt  the  significance  of  the  weakness  of  that 
handsome  young  monarch,  Francis  I.,  as  we,  looking 
back  upon  the  young  Reformation  and  the  aged  Renais- 
sance, feel  it  to-day.  To-day's  student  of  principles  and 
progress  cannot  help  but  pity  the  shade  of  the  king,  as  in 
the  Louvre  he  beholds  that  armor  made  for  a  man  of 
six  feet  rusting  beneath  the  memory  of  one  whose  great- 
est failures  grew  out  of  a  dominance  of  physical  over 
spiritual  powers. 

The  governance  of  Artus  Gouffier  had  so  influenced 
Francis  that  he  was  happier  at  the  recognition  of  his 
skill  when,  having  found  the  ferocious  boar  which  he  had 
put  in  the  courtyard  of  Amboise  entering  the  living- 
apartments  of  the  castle,  he  recklessly  drove  his  sword 
into  the  beast,  and  hurled  him  wounded  to  death  back 
into  the  courtyard,  than  he  could  be  at  the  success  which 
he  achieved  at  discussing  Latin  poetry  with  Marguerite. 
Only  the  influence  of  Ami  made  him  at  times  more  fond 
of  Greek  philosophy  than  of  the  hunt. 

Nouvisset  had  wakened  when  Ami  said  aloud,  "  I  like 
not  Anthony  Duprat." 

"That  is  because  you  love  your  king,"  said  Nouvisset, 
who  knew  Duprat  to  be  a  lover  of  absolute  power  and  a 
venal  servant  of  the  ambitions  of  Louise  of  Savoy.  "  The 
shadow  of  the  President  of  the  Parliament  "  —  for  such 
was  Duprat  —  "  may  be  lifted  by  the  Constable  Bourbon, 
who  will  now  perhaps  be  chancellor  of  France.  The 
king's  mother  will  make  her  own  use  of  the  experience 


128  MONK  AND  KNIGHT. 

of  the  premier,  whom  she  fears ;  and  she  will  listen  — 
may  Heaven  grant  it !  —  to  the  young  constable  whom 
she  loves." 

"  Do  kings  and  kings'  mothers  fall  in  love  with  whom 
they  will?"  asked  the  young  Waldensian,  who  had  not 
yet  been  invited  by  his  sovereign  into  intimate  acquaint- 
ance with  any  of  the  numerous  intrigues  of  the  court. 

"Yes,"  said  the  old  knight,  "and  they  throw  them 
away  when  they  get  weary  of  them  ;  but  of  that  we  must 
not  talk.  Ami,  I  am  glad  that  you  discern  the  haughty 
offensiveness  of  Anthony  Duprat." 

Nouvisset  knew  that  Ami's  unaroused  jealousy  would 
soon  flame  when  he  beheld  the  submission  into  which 
Duprat  was  leading  the  young  king.  He  was  more  than 
pleased  to  be  made  sure  that  Ami's  prophetic  instinct 
detected  the  peril  of  his  sovereign. 

"Now,"  said  the  teacher,  with  loving  pride,  as  he 
placed  his  hand  upon  the  shoulder  of  the  youth  whom 
he  had  instructed,  —  "  now  you  pass  into  the  service  and 
associations  of  Francis  I.,  King  of  France.  I  was  com- 
manded to  assist  in  your  proper  education.  It  has  been 
a  constant  conflict  against  many  of  the  theories  of  your 
friends  and  mine  ;  and  knowing  what  your  life  is  to  be, 
it  has  been  in  opposition  to  the  tendencies  and  spirit  of 
the  very  court  which  you  are  to  serve." 

"  Perhaps,"  gracefully  remarked  Ami,  "  I  shall  be  no 
less  able  to  perform  knightly  service  to  his  Majesty  be- 
cause I  have  been  thus  led.  Francis  I.  can  do  his  own 
thinking.  My  value  to  him  and  to  the  world  shall  lie 
in  the  fact  that  you  have  taught  me  to  do  mine.  I  am 
grateful." 

"  Oh,  you  brave  but  ignorant  Waldensian  !  "  Nouvisset 
was  about  to  exclaim ;  but  he  had  no  wish  to  curb  the 
genius  which  belongs  to  youth,  or  to  make  another  refer- 
ence to  Ami's  earlier  life.  He  however  proceeded  to  re- 
mark instead :  "  It  is  a  majestic  hour  in  human  history. 


A    YOUNG  SCHOLAR  AND   A    YOUNG  KING.      1 29 

I  have  tried  to  make  your  intelligence  as  broad  as  your 
coming  duties.  You  have  seen  the  peasant,  and  you 
have  lived  with  him  at  Chilly.  You  have  known  the 
king,  and  you  are  at  home  in  his  castle.  Be  careful  of 
the  rights  of  both.  Be  sure,  —  I  also  dislike  Duprat ! 
—  be  sure  that  Francis  the  King  of  France  has  no  right 
which  infringes  upon  the  best  hope  of  the  meanest  of 
his  subjects.  I  beg  you  to  forget  not  that  your  own 
father  was  a  cottager  and  a  peasant." 

"  But  my  mother,"  said  the  young  knight,  who  was 
already  the  victim  of  a  court  atmosphere,  —  "  my  mother 
was  the  daughter  of  a  count." 

Nouvisset  saw  that  it  was  useless  to  expect  this  sus- 
ceptible and  brilliant  youth  to  escape  entirely  the  passion 
for  noble  ancestry  which  beset  the  veriest  menial  at  the 
castle. 

"Your  mother  told  you  of  knighthood,  and  you  are 
now  able  to  endure  privations,  fatigues,  and  service  as  a 
knight.  You  know  thoroughly  the  use  of  arms,  you  were 
a  page  of  the  Duchesse  d'Angouleme  ;  and  Bayard  him- 
self has  given  you  his  heartiest  word  of  praise.  In  games 
and  fencing  you  are  sufficiently  successful ;  and  even 
Robert  La  Marche  is  unequal  to  you  in  the  tilt  and 
tournament." 

It  was  the  hour  when  never  so  true  was  the  saying  of 
the  eloquent  Chartier :  "  The  senseless  notion  of  to-day 
is  that  a  nobleman  has  no  need  to  know  the  alphabet ; 
that  it  is  derogatory  to  a  well  born  man  to  be  able  to  read 
and  write." 

Ami,  like  all  other  men,  was  as  egotistic  as  he  was 
jealous. 

"  I  have  this  day  completed  a  translation  of  some  of 
Plato's  '  Gorgias  '  for  you,  my  best  helper,"  said  he. 

"Yes;  you  have  learned  the  way  to  Athens.  Ami, 
you  must  go  back  to  Greece  with  France  in  your  bosom, 
before  France  can  go  forward  to  her  destiny.  Be  true 
VOL.  i. —  9 


I3O  MONK  AND  KNIGHT. 

enough  to  your  king  to  keep  the  fires  of  thought  burning 
at  his  court.  He  is  generous,  extravagant,  reckless. 
I  dislike  the  presence  of  Duprat.  You,  my  bright 
boy,  you  must  teach  the  king  the  gallantry  of  learning. 
Many  a  lady  for  whom  the  knight  may  rush  into  the 
fray  is  altogether  unworthy  of  such  devotion.  The 
only  mistress  worthy  of  such  blind  and  heroic  love  is 
learning." 

"So,  also,  religion?"  inquired  the  young  man. 

The  Greek  said  nothing.  He  was  anxious  to  avoid  a 
topic  so  delicate,  upon  which  an  honest  and  honorable 
pagan,  such  as  he  was  striving  to  be,  could  not  speak 
without  assaulting  all  that  Ami  was  soon  to  hold  dear. 


CHAPTER  XI. 

THE  HOLY  CATHOLIC  CHURCH. 

The  Church  of  God,  —  that  Church  which  wound 

Around  the  globe  the  Apostles'  zone : 
What  clasped  that  zone,  that  girdle  bound  ? 
The  Roman  unity  alone. 

AUBREY  DE  VERB. 

IT  was  not  strange  that  the  page  of  Louise  of  Savoy 
and  the  chosen  friend  of  the  young  king  should 
become  so  soon  a  loyal  child  of  the  Holy  Church.  The 
mind  of  Ami  was  of  the  mould,  and  it  was  dominated  by 
those  forces,  which  at  once  rendered  him  easy  of  ap- 
proach and  certain  of  being  profoundly  influenced  by 
that  attractive  power  wielded  by  the  Holy  Catholic 
Church.  If  to-day  often  upon  highly  cultivated  and 
oppositely  educated  men  the  Roman  Catholic  Church, 
shorn  of  the  splendid  and  arrogant  prerogatives  freely 
conceded  to  her  at  the  opening  of  the  sixteenth  century, 
crippled  by  the  victorious  march  of  learning  over  her 
innumerable  assumptions,  out  of  harmony  with  the  vast 
powers  which  drive  and  guide  the  gathered  significance 
of  modern  life,  antagonistic  to  the  distinctive  intellectual 
and  social  influences  which  make  the  Europe  of  to-day 
more  desirable  than  the  Europe  of  that  bloody  and  igno- 
rant yesterday,  many  of  her  miracles  abolished  by  science, 
more  of  her  saints  impaled  upon  the  sharp  results  of 


132  MONK  AND  KNIGHT. 

historical  research,  still  more  of  the  heretics  whom  she 
murdered  exalted  by  every  dictate  of  learning  and  man- 
hood, —  if  to-day  upon  these  she  exerts  a  fascination  so 
brilliant,  so  resistless,  as  to  attract  them  to  worship  with 
glad  pride  at  her  shrines,  what  must  have  been  the 
splendor  of  the  charm  upon  such  a  youth  at  such  a  lofty 
moment  in  the  history  of  this  gorgeous  institution? 

It  was  before  a  boy  in  whose  veins  rushed  the  char- 
acteristic currents  of  luxurious  France  and  sunny  Italy 
that  this  majestic  power  was  to  exhibit  and  enforce  her 
persuasions.  Her  right  to  rule  him  was  to  be  voiced 
through  every  eloquent  art,  and  uttered  by  every  com- 
manding tongue.  Kings  and  queens,  with  their  diadems 
and  thrones,  were  to  be  missionaries  unto  him.  Cardi- 
nals and  popes,  with  blazing  apparel  and  fiery  tiaras, 
were,  if  possible,  to  make  this  promising  child  a  proselyte. 
Beautiful  women  amidst  dazzling  gems,  seductive  enthusi- 
asts in  plume  and  helmet,  crowned  rulers  in  imperial 
palaces,  wo  rid- famed  scholars  in  halls  of  learning,  were 
to  vie  with  renowned  saints  in  pathetic  poverty,  for  the 
establishment  of  the  Virgin's  shrine  in  the  heart  of  this 
exiled  and  orphaned  Waldensian.  For  years  the  Roman 
hierarchy,  at  the  moment  of  most  superb  rule,  with  all 
the  pageantry  it  might  assume,  with  all  the  holiness  to 
which  it  must  pretend,  in  the  immediate  presence  of  the 
prince  most  promising  to  its  haughty  ambitions,  was  to 
utter  its  curses,  pronounce  its  benedictions,  intone  its 
messages  of  life  and  death,  exhibit  its  sublime  ceremonial 
before  a  homeless  boy,  without  a  solitary  whisper  to 
dissolve  the  stupendous  illusion. 

The  bright,  quick,  nervous,  and  comprehensive  imagi- 
nation of  his  father,  Caspar  Perrin,  was  his  own ;  and  in 
him  it  had  all  the  restless  vigor  and  fearless  strength 
which  characterize  that  faculty  in  large-brained  chil- 
dren. Ami  possessed  mental  energy  and  grasp  ;  and  the 
imagination  of  the  boy  was  conscious  of  no  limitations 


THE  HOLY  CATHOLIC  CHURCH.  133 

in  its  horizon-line,  nor  did  it  conceive  of  a  star  to  which 
it  might  not  fly.  His  life  was  full  of  pictures,  thrown  off 
by  the  tireless  operation  of  this  artist-power ;  and  ever 
was  it  searching  height  and  depth  for  some  new  or  more 
entrancing  vision.  Symbolic  representations  of  ideas 
crowded  upon  his  eager  soul ;  images  of  abstract  truths 
made  his  mind  a  fascinating  picture-gallery. 

In  youth  imagination  not  only  dreams  her  fairest 
dreams,  but,  often  weary  of  dreaming,  it  is  the  imagina- 
tion of  youth  alone  which  seeks  for  the  largest  ministry 
of  noble  symbols. 

The  Holy  Catholic  Church  held,  at  that  hour,  the 
loftiest  achievements  of  imagination  in  her  jewelled  hand. 
That  institution  alone,  at  that  moment,  called  upon  every 
energy  of  such  a  boy's  imagination.  If  he  believed  her 
legends,  his  imagination  used  its  wildest  freedom.  If  he 
accepted  her  solemn  and  consecrated  story,  his  imagina- 
tion must  dominate  his  reason.  If  he  allied  his  hope 
with  her  promised  destiny,  his  imagination  had  pre- 
empted the  realm  of  the  entire  future.  From  the  lowest 
hell  peopled  with  blackest  devils,  to  the  highest  heaven 
crowded  with  angels  and  resonant  with  saintly  songs; 
from  the  farthest  past  with  its  thrilling  legend  to  the 
remotest  future  with  its  grandest  triumph  for  the  Church, 
—  it  was  an  unapproachable  and  unimpeded  march  for 
this  faculty  divine. 

With  the  very  beginnings  of  Catholic  worship,  the 
imagination  was  called  to  the  heroic  task  of  sympathy 
with  pictures  of  sin  and  of  salvation  which  made  the 
world  alive  with  presences.  In  the  waters  of  baptism 
imagination  was  asked  to  insert  the  power  of  regenera- 
tion. In  the  Holy  Eucharist  the  imagination  must 
detect  renewing  grace  ;  and  despite  the  lapse  of  centuries, 
it  was  expected  to  taste  the  very  blood  and  flesh  of 
Incarnate  God.  In  the  sacrament  of  penance  the 
imagination  must  see  sins  forgiven.  When  some  human 


134  MONK  AND  KNIGHT. 

being  by  his  side  entered  holy  orders,  the  imagination 
must  discern  the  replenishing  of  a  soul  by  omnipotence 
itself;  and  when  death  came,  the  imagination  was  ex- 
pected to  observe  in  the  Extreme  Unction,  on  this  side 
the  grave,  the  consummation  of  this  gracious  process; 
and  beyond  the  grave  it  was  to  send  its  prayers  to 
an  imagined  world,  amid  whose  lights  and  shadows  the 
lost  friends  wander,  above  them  all  the  Mother  of  God 
beseeching  her  Son  to  save.  No  institution  or  power  of 
earth  ever  so  honored  and  so  bewitched  the  imagination 
as  has  the  Holy  Catholic  Church. 

As  with  a  king  and  a  knight  he  entered  the  cathedral, 
his  imagination  met  in  passionate  admiration  the  loftier 
and  trained  imagination  of  illustrious  architects.  In  their 
souls,  under  the  inspiration  or  command  of  the  Church, 
sprang  the  innumerable  arches,  the  stately  columns,  the 
solemn  vaults  which  half  revealed  and  half  concealed 
infinity.  Human  hope  had  arisen  and  become  incarnate 
in  the  vast  cathedral.  Human  aspiration  had  shot  up- 
ward, with  a  wild  sublimity  which  fascinated  the  youth, 
in  spires  lost  in  the  heavens.  Far  on  the  summits  of  the 
swelling  domes,  which  amid  the  purpling  clouds  and 
azure  distances  rivalled  the  solid  grandeur  of  the  rich 
blue  hills,  as  they  lifted  themselves  above  the  roar  of 
human  passions,  troubles,  cares,  and  sorrows,  stood  clear 
the  all-victorious  cross,  solitary  in  unvexed  brilliance, 
glowing  with  triumphant  fire. 

Every  sacred  place  was  either  glorious  with  rags  and 
relics,  which  latter  were  the  emblems  of  heroic  poverty, 
or  splendid  with  the  testimonies  of  genius  and  gorgeous 
with  the  tributes  of  power.  The  finest  genius  of  earth 
had  studded  the  long  lines  of  vast  interiors.  Alabaster 
and  gold  had  yielded  themselves  to  the  artistic  energy 
which  worshipped  as  it  toiled.  Peasant  and  prince  had 
piled  upon  the  dazzling  altars  their  devotions  and  their 
rubies.  Stately  processions,  with  gleaming  armor  and  in 


THE  HOLY  CATHOLIC  CHURCH.  135 

gayest  color,  even  then  walked  solemnly  beneath  the 
lofty  arches.  Barefooted  bishops  carried  blazing  cruci- 
fixes ;  and  undefeated  soldiers  bore  the  white  mantle  of 
the  Virgin,  under  the  gigantic  cupolas.  Nave  and  tran- 
sept met  in  fondest  intersection  above  the  uncovered 
heads  of  weeping  kings  and  angry  popes.  Carrara  mar- 
bles, touched  and  moulded  by  the  most  exquisite  art, 
bas-reliefs,  and  symbolic  sculptures  surrounded  pulpits 
resting  on  carven  apostles  and  martyrs;  and  within 
their  holy  precincts  stood  the  vicars  of  omnipotent 
Jehovah. 

Without  this  magnificence,  enclosing  it  like  an  impreg- 
nable fortress,  huge  walls,  created  of  blocks  from  the 
everlasting  hills,  rose  grandly  by  the  side  of  the  pauper's 
grave  and  the  king's  castle.  Adorned  with  facades  whose 
bold  and  beautiful  outlines  testified  to  the  pride  and 
piety  of  ages  ;  decorated  gables  and  pinnacles  out  of  whose 
recesses  looked  benignantly  saints  and  prophets ;  finials 
and  canopies  under  whose  pointed  arches  faith  had 
placed  her  symbols ;  shafts,  capitals,  and  cornices  which 
rehearsed  the  sacred  history  and  ardent  prophecies  of  seer 
and  psalmist,  —  the  whole  noble  mass  seemed  never  so 
much  "  frozen  music  "  as  when  the  thunders  of  melody 
were  rolling  through  its  capacious  aisles  and  echoing 
from  arch  to  arch  in  the  groined  and  fretted  roof,  while 
between  the  noisy  world  without  and  the  untroubled 
world  within,  through  countless  windows,  the  sun  poured 
his  richest  splendors,  flooding  the  jewelled  mitre  and  the 
peasants'  rags  with  myriad  glories  which  surged  like 
silent  waves  midst  clouds  of  incense,  against  the  Virgin's 
shrine. 

For  years,  without  a  break,  the  vision  of  such  triumphs 
of  imagination  was  to  work  upon  a  lad  whose  best  mem- 
ory held  the  picture  of  a  little  nook  in  the  midst  of  the 
mountains,  where  his  father  gathered  together  the  igno- 
rant but  honest  herdsmen  and  their  families  and  some- 


136  MONK  AND  KNIGHT. 

times  preached  to  them  in  simple  words,  where  poverty 
was  not  so  poor  as  to  be  ragged  and  monkish,  where 
religion  was  so  barren  of  ceremonial  as  to  seem  mean 
and  insignificant. 

Nouvisset  and  he  had  often  stood  together  and  stud- 
ied the  southern  and  western  fronts  of  Notre  Dame. 
Then  the  old  man  would  tell  him  of  the  streams  of  time 
which  had  borne  down  upon  their  current  the  ideals, 
hopes,  tendencies,  which  were  embodied  in  that  archi- 
tecture, and  of  the  wreckage  enclosed  within  those 
walls. 

"  See,"  said  Nouvisset, —  "see  how  such  a  cathedral 
is  the  only  honest  historian  !  There  are  energies  from 
great  times  and  from  many  lands  toiling  in  those  work- 
men. The  past  is  incarnate  here  in  the  various  styles 
of  architecture.  There  is  the  Roman ;  but  it  took  a 
hundred  currents  from  far  out  at  sea  to  make  it.  Every 
surge  of  the  waters  in  the  sea  of  thought  or  feeling 
has  modified  it.  Above  the  Roman,  the  tale  is  told  of 
another  more  aspiring  and  more  worshipping  era  in  the 
life  of  men.  Away  yonder,  near  the  top  of  the  picture, 
the  struggling  harmonies  of  the  Parthenon  and  the  Forum 
are  visible.  Do  you  see  it?  " 

Ami  was  conscious  that  Greece  and  Rome,  and  the 
France  which  reached  backward  to  both  these  nations, 
towered  before  him  toward  heaven.  Various  and  widely 
separated  centuries  had  told  the  story  of  their  deepest 
life  in  that  vast  fane. 

"  If  I  were  not  so  old,"  said  the  teacher,  "  I  would 
make  these  churches  tell  their  story.  It  would  be  an 
honest  history  which  they  would  relate.  The  men  who 
made  them  did  not  mean  to  write  history,  and  so  they  did 
not  lie.  The  true  story  of  man's  life  lies  in  his  temples, 
not  in  the  parchment  records  about  battles  and  sover- 
eigns, not  in  the  mouths  of  priests,  but  in  the  way  they 
have  piled  stones  upon  one  another.  Ami,  T  hope  you 


THE  HOLY  CATHOLIC  CHURCH.  137 

will  do  that.  But  I  am  sure  you  cannot  do  it  and  be 
a  popular  man  at  court.  Serious  things  are  at  a  dis- 
count. The  court  is  only  playing  with  learning,  amus- 
ing itself  with  art;  and  now  it  is  a  little  worried  by 
Lefevre,  Louis  de  Berquin,  and  others  of  the  reform- 
ing crowd.  It  may  find  them  a  greater  annoyance  by 
and  by." 

Ami  wandered,  by  permission  of.  the  king  and  priests, 
into  the  cathedral  itself.  It  chanced  to  be  the  hour 
when  the  long  and  elaborate  services  incident  to  the 
visit  of  the  Bishop  of  Paris  were  at  their  highest  point 
of  magnificence.  He  sat  where  he  beheld  pictures 
and  heard  harmonies;  and  as  he  listened  and  saw, 
he  wished,  in  a  child's  dim  way,  that  little  Alke  could 
have  known  of  these ;  and  above  all,  that  his  poor 
slain  father  had  seen  and  heard  what  majestic  powers 
were  there. 

"  Certainly,"  his  thought  was,  "  he  did  not  know  how 
beautiful  it  all  is,  or  how  great.  If  he  had  known  of  it 
all,  he  would  never  have  been  a  heretic." 

As  the  cardinal,  borne  upon  the  shoulders  of  four 
lords,  came  in  with  the  long  procession  of  knights  and 
auditors,  he  remembered  indistinctly  but  forcefully  his 
father's  unadorned  presence  or  that  of  the  guide t  as 
he  talked  without  authority  about  holy  things  to  the 
mountaineers.  How  poor  and  worn  it  all  seemed  now, 
as  the  brilliant  robe  of  the  cardinal  blazed  in  a  new 
light ! 

Ami  could  not  forget  one  of  those  frosty  evenings  in 
the  cavern,  and  the  haste  in  cutting  short  the  worship 
when  the  herdsmen  and  their  families  huddled  together 
to  sing  and  pray.  Art  had  not  touched  those  rocks  on 
which  they  sat,  moulding  them  into  friezes  or  transform- 
ing them  into  capitals. 

As  he  had  looked  about  the  proud  cathedral  for  an 
hour  before  entering,  he  had  gained  an  impression  of  its 


138  MONK  AND  KNIGHT. 

imposing  significance.  He  had  heard  that  it  stood  on 
the  spot  to  which  once  conquering  Romans  had  been 
gathered  in  a  pagan  shrine.  Within  those  walls  Hera- 
clius  had  sounded  the  trumpet-call  of  the  crusade  more 
than  three  centuries  before.  That  nave  had  been  lifted 
skyward  in  the  reign  of  Philip  Augustus.  From  the  hand 
of  the  founder  of  the  porch  which  he  had  just  left,  yea, 
in  this  very  temple,  Saint  Louis  had  taken  his  staff  and 
scarf.  Every  building  in  surrounding  spaces  seemed  to 
bow  in  reverence  before  this  consecrated  pile.  The 
Hotel  of  God  and  the  Palace  of  Justice  existed,  like  the 
Church  of  St.  Stephen  the  Martyr,  only  to  be  razed  to 
the  ground,  whenever  the  larger  effect  of  the  great  edi- 
fice might  demand  it. 

The  arches  crowded  with  the  statues  of  kings,  the 
figures  of  the  ancestors  of  the  Holy  Virgin,  the  vast 
windows  filled  with  scenic  grandeur,  were  forgotten  as  in 
solemn  procession  came  pouring  in  the  vicars  and  can- 
ons, choristers  and  officers,  and  the  one  hundred  and 
twenty  chaplains  of  the  spiritual  lord  of  Paris.  And 
just  then  the  whole  cathedral  trembled  with  the  mighty 
harmonies  which  a  master-hand  found  in  the  great  organ. 
As  Ami  had  listened  to  the  love-songs  and  pious  hymns 
which  the  king  had  written,  and  which  he  would  often 
sing  accompanied  with  the  lute,  he  had  often  thought 
more  favorably  of  the  crusading  hymns  and  simple  sacred 
lays  which  had  come  to  the  ears  of  his  childhood.  His 
soul  had  also  been  ravished  with  chants,  rendered  amidst 
other  gorgeous  ceremonies  by  a  cohort  of  musicians  and 
choristers.  Masses  of  the  Gregorian  order  he  had  heard, 
rivalling  the  secular  songs  which  commemorated  battle- 
fields and  had  reorganized  armies.  The  choir  which 
sang  them  was  one  of  the  richest  gifts  which  passed 
from  Louis  XII.  to  Francis  I.  In  1515  Milan  heard  its 
notes,  while  Leo  X.  was  charmed.  Melodies  low  and 
sweet,  psalms  echoing  with  the  thunder  of  battle  or  the 


THE  HOLY  CATHOLIC   CHURCH.  139 

throb  of  a  shepherd's  heart,  Te  Deums  which  wove 
their  fine  harmonies  of  the  most  opulent  tones,  Glo- 
rias which  breathed  of  heaven,  had  swept  Ami  into  an 
ecstasy  of  devotion.  The  masters,  Ambrose,  Gregory, 
Fortunatus,  Saint  Hilary,  and  Robert  II.  of  France,  Peter 
Damian,  Saint  Bernard,  and  Thomas  a  Kempis,  had  each 
of  them  allied  the  tenderest  words  or  the  sweetest 
chords  with  the  genius  of  the  brilliant  chorister  Guillaume 
Guinaud,  and  the  king's  chapel-master,  Claude  de  Ser- 
misy,  to  uplift  and  lead  the  worship.  But  never  before 
had  the  soul  of  the  boy  been  so  moved  by  the  might  of 
sweet  sounds.  Whispers  of  angels  seemed  to  linger  and 
float  upon  the  thunderous  waves  of  harmony,  as  the 
great  building  quivered  in  their  movement.  It  ap- 
peared impossible  that  his  father  ever  could  have  heard 
such  rich  melodies.  The  Holy  Church  alone  seemed 
able  to  wed  such  chords,  and  possess  such  pledges  of 
heaven. 

These  harmonies  seemed  to  vie  with  those  which  had 
been  caught  by  artists  of  equal  power,  and  fastened  in 
the  great  windows  of  this  august  fane.  The  eye  became 
an  avenue  through  which  the  Church  drove  its  arguments 
of  heavenly  beauty  and  superb  dominion ;  and  yet  he 
knew  not  that  he  was  then  the  beholder  of  but  one  mo- 
ment's splendor  in  one  building,  among  many  throughout 
all  Europe,  whose  windows  had  told,  in  many- colored 
poetry  and  eloquence,  the  story  of  the  Church.  Age 
after  age  this  eloquence  had  gathered  in  opulent  strength 
and  increasing  beauty.  Holy  pensiveness  had  for  centu- 
ries dwelt  under  prismatic  and  harmonious  glory.  Every 
variety  of  tint,  every  excellence  of  position,  every  inspir- 
ing or  pathetic  scene  in  the  life  of  lawgiver,  saint,  psalm- 
ist, prophet,  martyr,  Virgin,  or  Christ,  had  been  put  under 
tribute  to  furnish  with  completeness  this  sacred  pageantry. 
Distinguished  artists  had  labored  with  the  molten  sand ; 
illlustrious  minds  had  shaped  the  fragile  products  ;  patient 


140 


MONK  AND  KNIGHT. 


enthusiasts  had  selected  the  pigments ;  great  painters 
had  arranged  the  brittle  pieces  with  an  ingenious  indus- 
try ;  eminent  architects  had  set  the  brilliant  combinations 
in  their  places,  until  the  choir,  apse,  altar,  and  mosaic 
floor  on  which  Europe  worshipped,  appeared  a  sacred 
dream  of  transcendent  radiance. 


CHAPTER   XII. 

THE    HOLY    CATHOLIC    CHURCH. 

For  this, 

The  gospel  and  great  teachers  laid  aside, 
The  decretals,  as  their  stuffed  margins  show, 
Are  the  sole  study.     Pope  and  Cardinal, 
Intent  on  these,  ne'er  journey  but  in  thought 
To  Nazareth,  where  Gabriel  op'd  his  wings. 

DANTE  (Gary's  translation). 

AMI  made  no  wild  plunge  into  the  bosom  of  the 
Church,  because  of  any  desperate  desire  to  es- 
cape the  perils  of  infidelity.  His  personality  was  sim- 
ply weaker  than  the  institution  which  overshadowed  him. 
The  imagination  of  the  boy  was  taken  by  storm. 

Not  less  impressive,  however,  to  a  youth  of  this  na- 
ture was  the  impression  which  the  Church,  ancient  and 
catholic,  made  upon  such  as  was  he,  as  he  was  led  by 
so  amiable  an  instructor  into  the  study  of  history. 

Since  that  hour  when  Ami  sat  at  the  feet  of  Nouvisset, 
the  unreformed  Catholic  Church  has  added  so  many 
dark  and  bloody  pages  to  the  story  of  humanity,  and 
history  has  been  written  with  such  honest  freedom,  that 
we  can  scarcely  appreciate  the  impression  made  upon  his 
mind  as  he  saw  this  ever- young  and  growing  institution 
stretch  the  list  of  her  triumphs  from  the  hour  when, 
having  fought  with  infuriated  beasts,  she  rose  out  of  the 
dust  of  the  Roman  amphitheatre,  to  the  hour  when  his 


142  MONK  AND  KNIGHT. 

grandfather  and  others  of  the  heretical  Waldensians  fell 
under  the  hands  of  Innocent  VIII. 

As  he  read  of  the  revolutions  which  had  crushed  em- 
pires and  overset  thrones,  he  saw  the  papal  chair  steady 
through  them  all.  He  saw  the  inextinguishable  youth 
of  the  Church  amidst  the  sneers  of  her  foes.  As  Chaucer 
in  England  had  smiled  at  the  Church,  the  Cathedral  of 
Milan  had  begun  to  rise  starward.  While  Poggio  laughed 
and  amused  the  South  of  Europe,  she  was  burning  Lol- 
lards, sending  La  Salle  into  the  wilds  of  America,  and 
commanding  Veronese  and  Fra  Angelico  to  decorate 
her  temples.  Something  resistless  and  grand  lay  in  the 
charm  of  these  gathered  centuries  upon  her  brow.  She 
had  stood,  in  the  person  of  Gregory  IX.,  in  that  hour 
when  the  University  of  Cambridge  was  founded,  and  the 
Cathedral  of  Cologne  was  yet  in  the  mind  of  Conrad. 
Years  before,  when  England  was  rejoicing  over  Magna 
Charta,  she  was  eloquent  in  Saint  Francis,  or  pious  in  the 
person  of  Elizabeth  of  Hungary. 

Did  Worms  Cathedral  begin  to  attract  the  footsteps  of 
a  solitary  and  rebellious  monk?  She  was  there  when, 
five  hundred  years  before,  its  foundations  were  laid.  She 
had  crowned  Charlemagne;  she  had  conquered  Ma- 
homet ;  she  had  entered  England  with  Saint  Austin ;  she 
had  seen  Romans  come  back  from  Britain ;  she  had 
beheld  Attila  defeated  and  Aurelius  die;  she  had  bled 
under  Vespasian  ;  she  had  walked  into  Nero's  prisons  un- 
afraid ;  she  had  looked  out,  even  from  them,  backward 
into  the  eternal  past,  feeling  her  relationship  to  the  pur- 
pose of  God,  while  Rome  staggered,  "  drunken  with  the 
blood  of  the  saints,  and  drunken  with  the  blood  of  the 
martyrs  of  Jesus." 

As  Ami  learned  of  strifes  and  factions,  pillaged  towns 
and  burned  cities,  mobs  and  armies,  crusades  and  dis- 
membered kingdoms,  he  saw  some  Ambrose  unquailing 
in  the  presence  of  a  Theodosius,  Flavius  successfully 


THE  HOLY  CATHOLIC  CHURCH.  143 

begging  for  Antioch,  or  Hildebrand  holding  barefooted 
Henry  IV.  at  his  command  amid  the  snows  of  Canossa. 
From  the  moment  when  Felix  trembled  unto  that  in 
which  Ami  beheld  Louise  of  Savoy  exercised  as  to  the 
opinions  of  the  Pope,  the  Holy  Church  had  preserved 
this  august,  imperative,  and  haughty  dominion.  She 
seemed  the  one  historic  fact,  changeless  and  unchange- 
able. Human  passion  had  builded  fires  at  her  feet  which 
she  had  quenched.  Royal  licentiousness  had  brought 
flagrant  sins  in  her  sight,  and  the  sinner  she  had  ex- 
communicated. Rich  barons  had  oppressed  her  poor, 
until  she  had  punished  their  rapacity.  Goth  and  Hun 
and  Vandal  had  sought  to  destroy  every  glory  of  old 
Rome,  while  she  had  hid  the  powers  of  learning  and  of 
art  in  her  monasteries,  and  erected  a  new  and  spiritual 
Rome  upon  the  ruin. 

She  had  used  all  sorts  of  men,  —  Peter  the  Hermit 
and  Poly  carp,  Barnard  and  Augustine,  Alcuin  and  Saint 
Anthony.  Her  line  encircled  the  history  of  human  nature, 
and  her  command  lay  upon  every  heart. 

As  he  dreamed  of  his  father  and  that  little  church 
amidst  the  hills,  he  was  perplexed  that  such  a  trifling  and 
infantile  movement  as  that  of  the  Waldensians  should  have 
ever  measured  its  babyhood  with  the  long  motherhood  of 
the  Holy  Church. 

"Could  my  father  have  read  a  page  of  history?" 
thought  he.  "  Is  it  possible  that  he  knew  of  the  councils 
which  are  beacons,  and  the  fathers  which  were  flames 
of  fire,  stretching  from  the  very  opening  into  the  cata- 
combs to  the  day  of  the  Pragmatic  Sanction?  He  was 
not  unlearned.  What  could  have  possessed  his  mind, 
that  he  forgot  the  ever-advancing  tread  of  this  gigantic 
power,  and  solemnly  satisfied  himself  with  the  child's- 
play  of  this  new-born  heresy  !  " 

So  mightily  did  the  awe-inspiring  past,  huge  and  in- 
explicable, fill  the  eye  of  Ami's  soul.  He  was  not  come 


144  MONK  AND    KNIGHT. 

to  that  intellectual  manhood  which  perceives  how  often 
ivy-like  fancies  of  ignorance  conceal  the  rough  walls 
within  which  dwell  horrible  tyrannies ;  nor  had  he  learned 
how  that  ancient  institution  threw  the  shadow  of  its  im- 
agined sacredness  upon  something  far  more  venerable, 
far  more  sacred,  —  the  soul  of  man. 

Reason  often  seems  late  in  coming  to  the  rescue  of 
true  faith. 

Every  such  superficial  notion  of  what  constitutes  sal- 
vation as  would  belong  to  the  mind  of  a  youth  without  a 
man's  experiences  with  sin,  was  satisfied  —  is  still  satis- 
fied—  with  the  priest  and  the  absolution.  Had  not 
God's  authority  been  deposited  with  his  confessor?  If 
full  satisfaction  had  not  been  made,  surely  the  experiences 
of  purgatory  would  make  heaven  certain.  In  obeying 
the  visible  hierarchy  the  boy  saw  the  power  which  saved. 
It  taxed  not  those  powers  of  his  soul  to  look  beyond,  — 
powers  which  are  later  in  maturing.  Those  conceptions  of 
sainthood  which  accompany  spiritual  youth,  —  the  lonely 
ascetic  living  his  negative,  self-conscious,  unaggressive 
life ;  the  meditative  pietist,  introspective  and  calm,  flee- 
ing from  the  world,  in  quick  retreat  from  the  battle  of 
life  with  its  hopes  and  despair,  its  fascinating  ambitions 
and  its  ennobling  problems,  —  these  were  satisfied  in 
the  roll  of  martyrs,  confessors,  and  heroes  of  the  Holy 
Church. 

As  he  remembered  the  struggling  in  his  father's  pray- 
ers at  the  fireside,  and  the  fervor  with  which  he  fought 
out  the  battle  of  life  in  the  world,  he  thought :  "  Oh,  if 
he  had  known  of  some  monastery  in  which  the  world 
never  came,  or  of  some  priest  whose  assertion  of  pardon 
was  ratified  before  the  throne  of  Heaven,  then  my  father 
could  have  been  the  saint  he  wished  to  be." 

A  present,  living,  growing  teacher,  with  plenitude  of 
power  to  condemn  or  to  forgive,  —  a  teacher  which  gave 
no  invitation  or  command  to  men  to  do  unpleasant,  toil- 


THE  HOLY  CATHOLIC  CHURCH.  145 

some,  bewildering  reasoning,  —  so  quieted  his  mind,  so 
reigned  above  the  rising  tumult  of  debate  in  his  soul, 
that  he  gave  over  to  the  Church  in  fee  simple  his  entire 
spirit. 

"Oh,  if  my  mother,"  said  he,  as  he  thought  of  one 
conversation  which  he  dimly  remembered  to  have  heard 
long  ago,  —  a  conversation  in  which  she  sadly  broke 
back  to  the  old  Church,  and  cried  for  the  Eucharist,  — 
"  oh,  if  my  mother  had  lived,  it  may  be  that  he  who  died 
for  the  new  heresy  had  died  in  peace  in  the  bosom  of 
the  Church  ! " 

Sufficient  truth  the  Church  has  always  held  to  make 
her  better  than  the  world  from  whose  tyranny  men  desire 
to  escape.  With  ease  she  comes  to  the  soul  of  a  peni- 
tent or  to  the  heart  of  a  struggling  saint,  and  advocates 
an  ever-present  grace.  She,  however,  commands  peace 
where  there  is  no  peace.  She  rouses  the  spirit  to  desire 
the  ministries  of  her  peculiar  power;  she  puts  a  swift 
forgiveness  upon  vices,  and  makes  sacred  the  spiritual 
conceit  which  is  its  consequence.  Thus,  as  Ami  was 
swept  on  into  the  atmosphere  of  a  designing  hypocrite, 
amid  the  splendors  of  the  court  of  her  son  Francis  I., 
the  unreformed  Church  caught  the  weaknesses  of  his 
impulsive  youth  and  blessed  them. 

The  warm  currents  of  his  mother's  blood  gave  to  this 
youth  a  large  emotional  life.  The  Church  of  the  six- 
teenth century  dazzled  the  imagination,  and  developed 
while  it  fed  the  emotions  of  men. 

The  music  breathed  those  sounds  which  rolled  through 
the  chambers  of  the  heart  in  deep  diapason.  Every 
chord  which  uttered  tenderness,  every  note  which 
touched  the  sensibilities,  every  instrument  which  swept 
the  feelings,  every  combination  which  deepened  sorrow 
for  sin,  quickened  a  love  of  goodness,  filled  the  eye 
with  tears  of  gratitude  or  of  remorse,  was  employed  with 
unsurpassed  art  and  incredible  constancy.  The  windows 
VOL.  i. — 10 


146  MONK  AND  KNIGHT. 

chronicled  those  scenes  in  which  the  boy  Joseph  had 
been  sold,  the  child  Samuel  was  called  of  God,  the  per- 
secutor Saul  was  beholding  the  Christ,  the  Holy  Saviour 
was  agonizing  in  death,  the  saintly  Stephen  was  being 
stoned,  or  the  Mother  of  God  was  enthroned  on  high. 

The  altar  was  one  rich,  vast,  constant  appeal  to  the 
feelings,  —  agitating  them  by  its  pictures,  rousing  them 
by  its  services,  blessing  them  by  its  awful  significance. 
There  quivered  the  sacred  heart ;  there  bled  the  riven 
side  of  the  Redeemer ;  there  died  in  inconceivable  pain 
the  Son  of  God.  A  single  week  in  the  life  of  a  wor- 
shipper was  sufficient  to  create  an  era  in  the  history  of 
a  soul's  emotional  life.  A  Calvary  —  a  dark,  hideous, 
consecrated  Calvary  —  approached  painfully  by  slow 
progress  in  prayer,  and  with  meditation  upon  the  one 
saddest  scene  in  human  story ;  seven  stations,  each  more 
awful  in  suggestions  of  grief,  leading  at  last  to  a  realistic 
reproduction  in  the  mind  of  the  most  affecting  of  all 
deaths,  —  this  alone  opened  the  floodgates  of  the  soul. 

Not  even  the  worship  was  the  strongest  power  to 
engage  this  boy's  feelings.  Death  had  come  upon  his 
life ;  and  he  often  had  wondered  if  life  might  not  have 
been  less  tragic  if  his  mother  had  been  spared  to  him. 
He  knew  that  there  had  been  moments  when  her  intense 
zeal  for  the  cause  of  the  Waldensians  flagged  a  little ; 
and  once  he  buried  his  face  in  her  lap  when  she  told 
him  not  to  hate  the  statue  of  the  Virgin.  He  could  yet 
feel  her  hafnd  upon  his  head. 

To  this  boy  the  Holy  Church  came  with  the  realm 
beyond  the  grave,  peopled  and  very  human  in  its  ways. 
Angels  walked  with  the  lost  and  loved.  Prayers  which 
issued  out  of  his  affection  or  his  faith  as  a  witness  to  soli- 
tude and  to  suffering,  reached,  as  he  was  led  to  believe, 
beyond  the  grave,  and  filled  the  lives  of  the  dead  with 
benediction. 

Soon,  very  soon,  the  height  of  his  emotional  life  bore 


THE   HOLY  CATHOLIC  CHURCH. 


a  form,  —  the  form  which  he  adored.  He  was  a  mother- 
less boy.  In  immaculate  splendor,  clad  in  sinless  beauty, 
his  guardian,  his  friend,  Mary  the  Virgin  Mother  of 
God  was  enthroned  in  silence  and  without  ceremony 
upon  the  heart  of  the  orphan.  He  could  not  help 
thinking  that  his  own  mother  looked  like  the  vision 
which  he  beheld  when  he  took  the  sacrament. 


CHAPTER  XIII. 

FADING   FACTS  AND   LIVING   DREAMS. 

Glory  and  boast  of  Avalon's  fair  vale, 

How  beautiful  thy  ancient  turrets  rose  ! 
Fancy  yet  sees  them  in  the  sunshine  pale 

Gleaming,  or  more  majestic  in  repose, 
When  West  away  the  crimson  landscape  glows, 

Casting  their  shadows  on  the  waters  wide. 
How  sweet  the  sounds  that,  at  still  daylight's  close, 

Come  blended  with  the  airs  of  eventide, 
When  through  the  glimmering  aisle  faint  misereres  died. 

BOWLES 

LET  us  go  back  to  Somersetshire,  to  the  England  of 
monastic  days.  As  in  the  last  hour  of  that  sunny 
afternoon  he  welcomed  Vian  with  rebukes  and  tears, 
when  the  latter  entered  his  apartments  in  Glastonbury 
Abbey,  tired  and  dust-covered  from  his  journey  home- 
ward, Abbot  Richard  Beere,  conservative  and  politician, 
was  sure  that  a  long  and  unwearied  effort  must  be  made 
to  uproot  from  the  rich  soil  of  Vian's  young  mind  the 
seeds  which  two  such  men  as  More  and  Erasmus  had, 
perhaps  unwittingly,  sowed  therein.  He  knew  enough  of 
the  boy's  character  and  breeding  to  abandon  all  attempts 
at  forcing  him  into  credulity,  or  at  flogging  him  into 
hearty  obedience.  He  was  both  sadder  and  more  hope- 
ful when  he  saw  that  Vian  trembled  only  at  his  tears. 
Man  of  the  past  that  he  was,  the  head  of  Glastonbury  felt 


FADING  FACTS  AND  LIVING  DREAMS.          149 

that  he  must  summon  up  the  entire  force  of  that  past  of 
which  he  was  master,  if  he  should  obtain  for  the  Church 
the  future  which  gleamed  upon  the  brow  of  Vian.  It 
never  occurred  to  him  that  a  man  holds  the  past  only  as 
he  seizes  the  present,  and  through  that  the  future.  It 
never  concerned  him,  or  his  plans,  that  youth  gives  no 
surer  witness  to  its  own  genius  than  when  it  beats 
its  wings  uneasily  against  institutions  whose  glitter  and 
antiquity  have  bedazzled  the  feeble  eye  of  age. 

"  He  is  not  at  all  impressed  with  the  dignity  of  the 
Church,"  said  the  abbot  one  day,  as  if  forced  by  the 
disappointing  months  to  a  doleful  conclusion. 

The  next  day  he  would  win  him,  and  astonish  him  by 
the  splendor  with  which  a  servant  of  the  Holy  Church  in 
his  position  could  go  fishing. 

But  Vian  looked  upon  the  scene  much  as  did  Fra 
Giovanni,  who,  walking  with  a  brother,  —  the  custom  of 
Glastonbury  compelled  them  to  go  two  and  two,  no  man 
being  companionless  out  of  the  enclosure,  —  and  encoun- 
tering the  magnificent  cavalcade,  said  with  fine  irony, 
"This  cannot  be  a  procession  composed  of  men  who 
have  taken  a  vow  of  perpetual  poverty,  and  who  do  not 
love  the  gaudy  pleasures  of  the  wicked  world.  What 
think  you?  " 

The  long  retinue  of  more  than  one  hundred  elegantly 
costumed  monks,  bearing  arms  which  glittered  in  the  fire 
of  that  bright  day,  followed  after  the  abbot,  who  was 
preceded  by  a  solitary  and  muscular  brother  bearing  a 
huge  shining  crucifix. 

Every  doubt  as  to  the  persons  composing  the  train 
would  have  been  banished,  even  in  a  mind  less  ac- 
quainted with  such  pompous  scenes  than  Fra  Giovanni's, 
by  their  advance. 

"  Ah,"  said  Giovanni,  "  I  shall  have  to  flog  the  abbot 
for  his  pride.  Yet  it  is  all  so  churchly ;  it  is  only  the 
Lord  Abbot  of  Glastonbury  toiling  alone,  as  you  see, 


150  MONK  AND  KNIGHT. 

through  that  crowd  of  sycophants,  who  have  found  out 
somehow  that  he  is  going  fishing  for  a  perch,  and  who 
kneel  like  menials  for  his  blessing.  Ha  !  he  is  as  nobly 
attired  for  meeting  a  pike,  as  he  will  be  on  his  way  to 
Parliament,  when  he  will  astonish  Harry  himself  with  his 
mitre  and  crosier." 

Vian  had  fled  to  literary  pools,  and  was  casting  for 
living  ideas. 

As  the  afternoon  wore  away,  and  the  shadows  in  the 
scriptorium  grew  longer,  the  young  man  read  from  the 
Scripture  which  he  was  copying  with  another  novice  of 
the  same  age,  the  story  of  the  disciples  fishing  in  Lake 
Gennesaret.  It  was  boyish  logic,  perhaps,  and  certainly 
quite  evident  heresy,  that  led  him  to  make  certain  re- 
marks to  the  librarian  who  was  the  monk  nearest  to 
Giovanni  in  humor  and  sympathy. 

"Then  Peter  himself  had  no  retinue,  even  when  he 
fished  in  the  lake  ;  did  he?  " 

"  No,  the  Church  was  poor  in  those  days." 

"  And  yet  that  was  the  Church  of  apostles  and  mar- 
tyrs," said  Vian,  with  a  furtive  glance. 

"  Even  so ;  but  the  Holy  Church  was  poor  then," 
remonstrated  the  librarian,  who  was  humorous  as  he  lost 
ground. 

"And  pure,  also?"  asked  Vian;  "poor  and  pure  !  " 

"  Even  then  Judas  was  a  disciple." 

"  But  Judas,  who  was  not  poor  very  long,  was  not 
made  a  cardinal  or  a  bishop,"  firmly  added  this  son  of  a 
Wycliffite,  as  he  reverted  to  the  scene  of  the  morning. 
*  It  appears  to  me  —  I  know  that  I  can  understand  little 
—  but  it  appears  to  me  that  the  Holy  Church  is  not  so 
pure  as  when  she  was  poor.  Why  should  the  abbot  — 
and  he  is  not  even  Peter's  successor  —  why  should  he  be 
guarded  and  wear  costly  garments  ?  The  people  who  fell 
on  their  knees  before  him  as  he  passed,  acted  like  slaves, 
and  they  seem  very  ragged.  Peter  had  no  silver  and 


FADING  FACTS  AND  LIVING  DREAMS.         151 

gold ;  yet  he  blessed  people  like  unto  them.  Nobody 
seems  to  want  to  bless  them  now,  except  when  those  who 
bless  are  sure  to  receive  silver  or  gold.  I  know  I  cannot 
understand  it."  And  Vian  went  to  work  again,  copying 
with  firm  and  excellent  hand  a  page  of  vellum  which  lay 
before  him. 

"The  novice  is  a  thinker,"  said  the  monk,  as  he 
found  Giovanni  a  moment  later,  and  related  to  him  the 
conversation. 

Both  of  them  smiled,  when  Giovanni  said  :  "  It  will  be 
the  turn  of  the  thinker  soon.  The  abbot  has  something 
else  on  his  line,  besides  a  hook  in  that  novice.  Poor, 
disappointed  abbot !  He  knows  he  has  failed  to  impress 
Vian  with  the  grandeur  of  the  Church  when  the  Holy 
Church  goes  fishing.  He  will  try  it  again  when  the 
Church  goes  to  Parliament." 

At  length  the  day  which  Giovanni's  remarks  antici- 
pated came.  The  soft  airs  were  floating  like  whispers 
over  the  green  fields,  carrying  within  them  the  silent 
shadows  of  the  white  clouds  above.  The  cavalcade  was 
ready  to  start ;  but  Vian,  who  was  to  ride  at  the  side  of 
the  abbot,  could  not  be  found. 

What  a  night  the  boy  had  endured  !  When  the  morn- 
ing bell  tolled  for  matins,  he  was  on  his  knees  alone, 
praying,  as  he  had  heard  the  Lollards  pray  at  Lutter- 
worth.  Taking  his  seat  in  the  church,  he  sang  with  a 
trembling  and  weary  voice  the  fifteen  Psalms,  tears  run- 
ning  down  his  cheeks.  Fra  Giovanni  noticed  his  emo- 
tions, when  Nocturn  came,  and  then  missed  him,  when 
the  chanter  and  choir  returned  from  lauds.  No  one 
thought  the  fishing  excursion  of  the  day  before  to  have 
been  such  an  event  as  to  take  the  sweetest  voice  out  of 
that  choir.  Tierce  and  Morning  Mass  found  him  not ; 
and  he  was  absent  from  the  procession  which  wended  its 
way  to  the  chapter-house. 

The  sub-prior  hastily  discovered   these  facts,  as  he 


152  MONK  AND  KNIGHT. 

sought  to  relieve  the  agitated  mind  of  Abbot  Richard 
Beere.  Could  it  be  that  Vian  had  again  escaped? 

It  was  past  time  for  the  cavalcade  to  start. 

Still  did  the  airs  play  tenderly  with  the  tears  which 
quivered  upon  the  stern,  hard  face  of  the  abbot.  He 
would  not  move  toward  London.  He  believed,  in  a  dim 
but  potent  way,  that  the  child,  who  now  was  rapidly 
coming  to  be  a  man,  —  the  novice  Vian,  —  had  a  hold 
upon  the  future  which  he  would  fain  acquire  for  the 
Church.  It  might  be  lost  if  he  should  depart  at  that 
moment. 

Could  it  be  that  the  heresy  of  the  hour  had  such 
influence  ? 

Not  this  heresy  alone.  The  heart  of  the  Middle  Ages 
had  what  were  heresies  also  to  monasticism,  —  heresies 
which  were  often  more  potent  and  disruptive  than  those 
of  the  head. 

That  magnificent  procession  had  halted  because 
of  a  boy's  vision,  — a  vision  which  rose  above  the 
towers  of  Glastonbury,  and  outshone  the  splendor  of 
the  crucifix. 

While  the  abbot  was  worried,  and  hastened  to  the 
inevitable  conclusion  that  he  must  go  to  Parliament  at 
once,  the  sub -prior  was  beholding  something  of  the 
beauty  of  that  vision,  —  a  tattered  thing,  torn  as  it  was 
from  this  youth's  bosom;  still  its  fragmentary  beauty 
held  him  charmed. 

The  sub-prior  himself,  months  before,  had  made  the 
acquaintance  of  a  wonderfully  interesting  specimen  of 
human  nature,  to  say  the  least,  when  he  brought  Vian 
back  on  that  afternoon  from  More  and  Erasmus,  who 
were  glad  enough  to  give  him  up  to  Glastonbury.  His 
monastic  soul  had  gone  out  with  the  boy's  hopes ;  and 
his  worn  and  wasted  heart  pulsated  in  deepest  sympathy 
with  him,  as  the  youth  said,  "  I  hate  all  monks,  and  I 
love  Master  More." 


FADIATG  FACTS  AND  LIVING  DREAMS.         153 

The  remark  had  precipitated  a  vast  amount  of  vague 
sadness  in  the  sub-prior's  soul ;  and  now  it  was  full  of 
hard  crystals  of  doubt.  He  became  less  servile  in  his 
thoughts ;  and  often  he  saw,  or  thought  he  saw,  the  dawn 
just  ahead.  Still  he  was  sub-prior,  and  that  position  he 
need  not  give  up ;  still  would  he  be  loyal  to  the  abbot. 
He  quite  loved  the  young  Vian ;  and  when,  in  obedience 
to  the  abbot's  command,  he  continued  his  search  until 
he  found  the  youth  in  concealment,  living  in  a  sort  of 
dream,  as  he  afterward  told  the  prosaic  head  of  that 
abbey,  his  heart  was  touched ;  and  instead  of  a  rebuke, 
the  sub-prior  gave  Vian  a  pious  kiss.  It  was  also  suffi- 
cient to  emphasize  the  protest  within  him  against  the 
shadow  of  the  past.  The  sub-prior  had  kissed  the 
future. 

Parliament  and  the  abbot's  duties  there  must  be  at- 
tended to ;  and  on  the  assurance  that  all  was  well  with 
Vian,  the  procession  started,  the  heart  most  set  upon  its 
success  feeling  sad,  as  the  abbot  moved  on  and  mused 
concerning  the  dreaming  novice. 

"  I  wonder  what  he  can  be  dreaming  of.  Ah  !  Joseph 
dreamed,"  said  he. 

What  a  dream  for  one  who  had  already  shown  himself 
a  rationalist !  What  a  vision  for  one  who  had  so  soon 
found  his  life  environed  with  such  hard  realities  as  set 
themselves  against  even  the  propriety  of  such  an  halluci- 
nation as  was  Vian's  ! 

It  was  an  old  dream,  and  yet  in  the  midst  of  his 
mental  agony,  which  arose  at  his  contrasting  the  Church 
of  the  past  with  its  fraudulent  representative  in  the  pres- 
ent, it  came  to  the  youth  like  a  new  dream,  so  un- 
churchly,  so  apparently  impious,  but  also  so  imperious. 
The  sub-prior  in  after  years  saw  into  the  working  of  his 
mind.  In  a  youth's  dim  way  Vian  was  conscious  of 
what  was  going  on  within  himself  even  then.  He  had 
felt  himself  entirely  appropriated  by  that  great  ecclesias- 


154  MONK  AND  KNIGHT. 

tical  institution,  and  had  thought  indefinitely  of  his  own 
intellectual  individuality  only  as  a  dear  wreck. 

At  the  moment  when  he  was  discovered  by  the  sub- 
prior,  he  knew  that  he,  even  he,  abided  ;  and  he  was 
held  to  that  faith  by  a  dream,  —  a  vision  rather,  which 
could  bode  nothing  but  disaster  at  Glastonbury. 

It  was  a  lover's  dream. 

Friar  Noglas  of  Lutter worth  had  told  the  abbot  about 
what  he  was  pleased  to  term  "  the  child's  mental  afflic- 
tion." Even  his  mother  expressed  the  hope  that  no 
pains  would  be  spared  to  render  him  free  from  such  a 
mysterious  phantasm.  Only  Vian,  the  child,  took  a  sane 
view  of  the  remarkable  phenomenon.  It  had  not  re- 
curred for  five  years  until  on  that  night  after  the  sight 
of  the  fishing  expedition.  It  had  never  remained  so 
completely  in  charge  of  all  his  mental  faculties,  nor  did 
it  ever  appear  so  sacred  as  then. 

A  lover  always  dreams  in  portraits.  Even  if  his  fancy 
should  put  about  the  figure  which  he  beholds  a  land- 
scape like  Lorraine's,  love  yet  paints  like  Rembrandt ; 
and  the  richest  lights  and  shadows  fall  upon  some  human 
face.  Vian  was  born  a  lover ;  and  in  every  quality  of 
his  mind  he  was  a  painter.  It  was  not  remarkable, 
therefore,  that  in  his  very  boyhood  there  should  come 
slowly  and  abide  upon  his  soul  a  picture  which  had  all 
the  hues  of  ideality  and  all  the  lines  of  reality  within  its 
exquisite  features,  —  a  portrait  into  which  his  vivid  imagi- 
nation and  his  affectionate  heart  poured  their  treasured 
hopes,  —  the  portrait,  as  he  loved  to  say,  of  his 
"  soul's  mate."  It  used  to  furnish  his  mother  with  a 
sort  of  curious  amusement  to  hear  this  loving  boy  of 
hers,  in  the  long  summer  afternoons,  talk  of  a  radiant 
little  maiden  whom  he  had  never  seen,  and  whom  she 
knew  that  her  child  had  not  seen. 

She  at  first  had  thought  it  a  most  interesting  and  harm- 
less exercise  of  fancy  and  affection  in  which  he  indulged 


FADING   FACTS  AND  LIVING  DREAMS.         155 

himself,  when,  with  his  brown  curls  still  clinging  to  his 
boyish  head,  he  entertained  her  alone  beneath  the  pur- 
pling lilac-trees  in  the  garden,  discoursing,  like  a  poet, 
of  his  loved  one.  By  and  by  the  child  himself  appar- 
ently saw  that  the  phenomenon  of  a  little  boy  dealing  so 
deeply  with  such  passionate  energies  as  this  floating  por- 
trait had  inspired  within  him,  caused  his  mother  no  little 
concern.  He  always  remembered  hearing  a  conversa- 
tion which  occurred  without  his  presence  being  noted  or 
desired,  in  which  the  priest  Noglas  was  taken  into  the 
secret;  and  asked  if  he  did  think  there  could  be  the 
slightest  danger  of  madness  in  such  a  persistent  and  in- 
tense devotion  to  an  ideal  love. 

The  priest  was  worried.  He  nevertheless  assured 
her,  and  avowed  that  Lutterworth  thought  Vian  was 
to  be  a  great  man,  and  that  it  must  be  expected  that 
he  would  do  strange  things.  True,  the  boy  was  half 
spoiled. 

He  learned  then,  for  the  first  time,  that  in  him  centred 
the  pride  and  hope  of  the  whole  community,  and  that 
his  rather  large  acquirements  at  such  an  age  had  aston- 
ished the  respectable  talents  of  his  elders;  but  as  the 
little  fellow  had  heard  them  talk  of  means  which  should 
be  tried  to  divert  his  mind  from  this  picture  which  al- 
ways stood  on  the  easel  of  the  thought  and  hope  within 
his  soul,  he  ran  in  upon  the  conversation,  and  hid  his 
face  within  his  mother's  bosom,  as  he  told  her  that  he 
never  could  be  great  or  good  without  seeing  constantly 
this  picture  of  his  little  mate.  The  priest  retired  to  make 
his  plans. 

That  love  had  taken  possession  of  Vian's  life ;  it  was 
the  central  light  whose  radiance  made  everything  else 
visible.  It  was  the  solitary  silken  string  on  which  jewel 
after  jewel  of  that  young  life  was  being  strung.  The  be- 
wildered mother  saw  it  long  ago.  Throughout  a  boy- 
hood which  was  guarded  by  care  and  ambition,  as  the 


156  MONK  AATD  KNIGHT. 

days  were  lost  in  months  and  the  months  in  years, 
this  solitary  and  misunderstood  boy  was  painting  that 
ideal  portrait,  —  that  exquisite  picture  of  the  sweet 
little  girl  who  lived  somewhere  in  God's  universe,  and 
who  already  was  and  forever  would  be  the  real  wife  of 
his  soul. 

Gradually  did  the  portrait  grow.  As  he  grew  to  be  an 
older  child,  so  did  this  lovely  girl-image.  The  picture 
seemed  to  gather  loveliness  and  beauty  from  every  touch 
of  his  experience.  Did  his  eye  catch  sight  of  a  beautiful 
girl?  The  one  immaculate  flash  of  glory  which  made 
her  beautiful  went  into  that  picture  which  he  never  for- 
got. His  father  knew  nothing  of  this  process.  Did  his 
father  ever  read  from  the  line  of  a  poet,  or  from  the 
fragment  of  an  orator,  whose  delayed  message  now  came 
upon  the  sleepy  mind  of  Europe,  some  fine  characteristic 
which  belonged  to  human  nature?  Instantly  this  por- 
trait which  Vian  was  producing  bore  another  delicate 
line,  and  Vian's  loved  one  seemed  more  lovely.  As  he 
played  over  the  hills  and  through  the  dew-covered 
clover,  or  climbed  upon  the  hill-top  to  watch  the  soft 
tints  of  the  rising  sun,  or  gathered  bunches  of  wild-flowers 
for  her  whom  he  had  never  seen,  did  he  find  some  beau- 
teous tint  which  he  had  never  beheld  before  ?  Then  he 
became  a  painter  again ;  and  his  fancy  and  love  mingled 
that  erubescent  color  with  the  rich  blushes  upon  her 
cheek. 

As  sometimes  he  came  through  the  wood,  and  the 
birds  were  still,  and  only  the  lark  in  the  meadow  below 
the  streamlet  along  whose  flowery  banks  he  wandered 
so  much  alone,  was  talking  in  bird-tones  to  its  mate,  he 
would  sit  upon  the  soft  grass  and  listen.  Oh,  how  far 
away  did  she  seem  !  Then  he  listened  again.  Oh,  how 
near  she  came  ! 

He  could  almost  see  her  golden  hair,  and  her  sweet 
lustrous  eyes,  —  that  much  of  the  picture  he  never 


FADING  FACTS  AND  LIVING  DREAMS.         157 

changed.  He  could  not  listen  longer ;  the  strain 
was  too  intense.  She  was  too  far  away.  And  then 
he  would  gather  the  ripe  berries,  oozy  with  richness 
and  glossy  with  beauty ;  and  then  as  he  would  string 
them  for  her,  placing  one  after  another  upon  the  long 
grasses  which  he  found,  he  would  listen  again  for  her 
voice. 

One  day  he  heard  what  his  heart  certainly  knew  was 
her  voice.  His  dreams  always  took  him  to  that  spot 
where  for  years  he  had  gone,  as  upon  a  soul-pilgrimage, 
and  left  his  tears  with  the  morning  dews.  Then  the 
great  forest-trees  threw  their  cool  shadows  upon  it,  and 
the  wild  roses  made  the  air  fragrant  round  about ;  and 
the  brown-thrush  uttered  his  notes  amidst  the  woodland 
leaves. 

Now,  to  the  eye  of  a  traveller  in  rural  England,  it 
is  only  a  plain,  prosaic  pasture-field,  with  the  masses 
of  sunlight  falling  unbroken  upon  its  simplicity;  yet 
at  the  last  visit  one  who  bears  the  name  of  Vian  found 
there  a  beautiful  wild  rose,  which  lived  upon  a  broken 
and  ancient  little  bush,  and  seemed  to  have  come 
out  of  all  the  changed  circumstances  to  tell  him  of 
an  experience  whose  beauty  was  perennial.  That  rose 
was  carried  to  Vian's  grave,  and  placed  over  his  very 
heart. 

The  spot  is  as  sacred  as  heaven.  There  love  had 
heard  the  voice  of  his  loved  one,  whose  portrait  had 
been  worshipped  in  his  soul. 

As  before  that  morning,  to  which  he  was  always  return- 
ing, his  imagination  had  made  its  happiness  out  of  lines 
and  colors ;  so  after  that  morning  when  he  thought  he 
heard  her  voice,  imagination  found  also  a  noble  delight 
in  tones.  His  fancy  had,  up  to  that  day,  lived  in  his 
eye  ;  henceforth  it  should  also  live  in  his  ear.  He  must 
not  only  look,  he  must  listen,  if  his  soul  were  to  have 
the  fullest  joy. 


158  MONK  AND  KNIGHT. 

Sometimes  a  tone  of  the  voice  will  do  everything  to 
clear  up  and  make  vivid  the  lines  of  a  face.  Oftentimes 
one  finds  the  mind  looking  upon  some  mental  picture 
and  trying  to  remember  some  dear  line  in  its  exactness, 
when  suddenly  one  hears  the  voice  as  of  old,  and  the 
ear  helps  the  eye,  so  that  one  seems  to  have  a  definite 
picture  before  the  soul.  It  was  so  with  Vian  when  the 
sub-prior  found  him.  His  soul  had  listened  ;  and  he  had 
heard  her  voice.  Instantly  his  closed  eyes  saw  her,  as 
he  never  saw  her  before.  Oh  the  rapture  of  that  hour,  as 
he  both  saw  and  heard  ! 

Of  course  the  voice  was  just  the  voice  which  he  had 
expected  to  hear.  If  he  had  not  been  thinking  of  her 
at  all,  he  would  have  discovered  those  unique  tones 
in  the  midst  of  universal  confusion ;  but  as  his  soul  was 
intently  thinking  of  her,  the  sounds  which  seemed  to 
have  floated  to  earth  from  heaven  took  his  hushed  spirit 
prisoner,  and  he  said,  "  That  can  be  no  other  voice  than 
hers  ! " 

It  cannot  be  considered  marvellous  that  so  thoroughly 
did  these  tones  harmonize  with  the  pictured  tones  which 
his  eye  had  beheld.  The  voice  is  the  surest  interpreter 
of  character ;  its  tones  lie  deeper  than  the  lines  of  the 
face.  Yet  behind  face  and  voice  is  the  one  soul ;  and 
each  of  its  revelations  harmonizes  with  the  other,  when 
both  are  understood.  Vian's  sympathetic  spirit  heard  on 
that  June  day  the  very  tones  which  he  had  somehow  felt 
must  lie  in  the  breast  of  this  peerless  little  girl.  With 
what  commanding  sweetness  did  they  seize  upon  his  very 
life ;  with  what  delicate  authority  did  they  touch  his 
happy  heart ! 

Just  as  that  fancied  portrait  had  filled  every  chamber 
of  his  vision  with  its  radiant  beauty  and  satisfied  every 
demand  of  his  growing  culture,  so  these  sounds,  which 
floated  in  upon  his  soul  from  the  somewhere  of  God,  ran 
their  melodious  way  along  through  the  avenues  of  his 


FADING  FACTS  AND  LIVING  DREAMS.         159 

mind,  roused  his  thought  and  sentiment  to  a  strange 
ecstasy,  and  bade  his  soul  quiver  with  loving  emotion, 
as  he  gave  audience.  It  seemed  as  if  his  very  nature 
had  been  created  for  the  superb  harmonies  which  ap- 
peared to  lie  in  her  simplest  tone.  His  spirit  had 
become  a  palpitating  atmosphere,  which  caught  up 
and  transmitted  the  veriest  whisper  of  her  melody. 
Every  sound  came  into  him  like  a  sweet  wanderer; 
and  it  entered  through  unknown  tloors  into  his  heart, 
to  find  itself  forever  at  home.  Surely  there  was  but 
one  voice  in  the  whole  universe ;  and  his  ear  had 
listened  to  its  music.  Thrilling,  rich,  and  powerful,  its 
melody  had  stirred  him  again,  even  to  tears,  when  the 
sub-prior  found  him. 

Were  they  tears  of  sorrow  which  came  because  he  had 
heard  her  again  ?  No,  they  were  tears  of  joy  that  what 
he  had  so  often  seen  had  at  last  uttered  something  to  his 
soul  again.  It  seemed  that  every  sweet  chord  which  he 
had  ever  heard  elsewhere  was  woven  into  her  song.  The 
sighing  of  the  tree-tops  in  the  evening ;  the  laughing, 
rippling  melodies  of  the  brooks  which  tinkled  in  every 
silvery  drop  like  a  chorus  of  clear-voiced  bells  ;  the  liquid 
notes  of  the  bird  which  just  then  flew  out  into  the  sun- 
light to  be  touched  with  its  gold,  and  back  again  into 
the  emerald  forest ;  the  flute-like  harmonies  which  rose 
from  those  aeolian  harps  which  were  then  made  as  the 
slender  reeds  beyond  him  deflected  the  fragrant  southern 
breeze,  —  all  these,  beside  something  so  incommunicable, 
so  celestial,  so  unheard  before,  lived,  moved,  and  spoke 
in  that  incomparable  voice.  He  was  back  again  at 
Lutterworth.  He  stood  listening;  the  long  evening 
shadows  again  disputed  on  his  face  with  the  retreating 
sunshine;  the  voice  died  away.  With  tears  like  unto 
those  which  the  sub-prior  detected  upon  his  cheeks  even 
now,  he  had  often  thanked  God  for  what  he  had  heard, 
and  gone  wearily  homeward. 


l6o  MONK  AND  KNIGHT. 

The  sub-prior  withdrew ;  but  he  understood  it.     All 
that  night  Vian  lay  listening  in  vain  for  that  one  voice. 

"  Wearily  came  to  the  heart  of  the  night 
Echoes  of  music  which  lived  in  the  light  : 
Drearily  weeping,  the  night  throws  away 
Jewels  which  flashed  on  some  fair  yesterday." 

He  kept  saying  to  his  soul,  "  Somewhere  and  at  some 
time  I  will  see  that  face  and  hear  that  voice." 


CHAPTER   XIV. 


A   VISITOR    AT    GLASTONBURY. 

Hard  by,  the  monks  their  Mass  were  saying; 

The  organ  evermore 

Its  wave  in  alternation  swaying 

On  that  smooth  swell  upbore 

The  voice  of  their  melodious  praying 

Toward  heaven's  eternal  shore. 

AUBREY  DE  VERE. 

ON  the  evening  of  the  25th  of  May  there  arrived  at 
Glastonbury  Abbey  an  innocent- looking  man, 
who  immediately  excited  the  interest  of  every  one,  from 
the  Lord  Abbot  to  the  least  important  of  the  lay-brethren. 
He  was  a  countryman,  without  doubt ;  and  in  his  dress  he 
bore  every  evidence  of  having  no  small  desire  to  measure 
up  both  to  the  duties  which  devolved  upon  him  and  the 
place  of  their  performance.  Most  of  his  wardrobe  was 
upon  his  body ;  and  it  consisted  of  such  a  collection  of 
excesses  in  apparel  as  indicated  that  the  wearer  had 
perhaps  borrowed  for  the  occasion,  of  each  of  his  neigh- 
bors, the  one  most  pretentious  article  of  their  possessions, 
and  gathering  them  together  thus,  had  intended  to  im- 
press Glastonbury,  for  which  he  must  have  a  noble 
regard,  with  his  fitness  as  a  guest.  His  sturtops  were 
new  and  unworn  by  any  contact  with  the  rough  roadway 
which  he  must  have  travelled. 

VOL.  I  —  II 


1 62  MONK  AND  KNIGHT. 

"  How  did  he  get  here  without  even  soiling  the  laces 
of  his  boots  ?  "  was  the  query  propounded  by  the  humorous 
Giovanni.  "  He  must  have  dropped  down  from  the  skies. 
Ah,  no ;  that  could  scarcely  be.  The  trunk-hose,  stuffed 
as  they  are,  cannot  be  of  heaven.  There  would  not  be 
room  for  all  the  saints  of  the  calendar,  if  many  of  the 
celestial  inhabitants  should  persist  in  wearing  trunk-hose 
like  unto  his." 

The  garters  he  wore  were  of  Granada  silk,  which  con- 
trasted unpleasantly  with  his  close-fitting  doublet,  fast- 
ened as  it  was  around  his  waist  by  a  most  elaborately 
decorated  girdle  which  belonged  to  another  day,  and 
never  seemed  quite  sure  of  keeping  together  the  inhar- 
moniously  colored  garments  which  it  touched.  On  his 
head  was  a  green  hat  of  French  manufacture,  which  had 
a  brim  gayly  embroidered  in  silver  and  gold  ;  and  under 
his  significant  chin  peeped  out  an  elegantly  worked  shirt- 
band,  whose  whiteness  was  broken  in  upon  by  wandering 
threads  of  Coventry  blue. 

"The  great  breeches  which  he  has  upon  him  must 
have  made  his  journey  wearisome ;  for  he  came  to  us  on 
foot,"  remarked  Fra  Giovanni,  as  he  sought  to  contain 
his  humor,  when  the  visitor  came  sweating  through  the 
cloisters,  ambling  along  industriously  with  the  sub-prior, 
the  preposterous  amount  of  stuffing  in  his  trunk-hose 
making  a  respectable  distance  between  him  and  the 
superior. 

The  monks  became  jolly,  as  Giovanni  led  the  way  for 
their  merriment.  Gratitude  vied  with  good-humor ;  for 
every  one  who  came  to  break  the  dull  monotony  of  the 
monastic  life  was  looked  upon  as  a  benefactor.  Not 
always,  however,  were  the  monks  so  careful  to  preserve 
ascetic  decorum  so  far  as  to  prevent  their  having  what 
fun  they  might  find  in  the  appearance  of  an  itinerant 
saint  or  the  blunders  of  a  peripatetic  sinner  who  chanced 
to  travel  in  their  paths. 


A    VISITOR  AT  GLASTONBURY.  163 

One  of  the  monks  was  set  to  entertain  the  stranger, 
and  soon  found  out  that  he  had  come  from  a  part  of  the 
country  where  abbeys  were  not  held  in  the  highest  esteem, 
and  that  his  business  connected  itself  with  Vian. 

"From  Lutterworth  ?  "  That  explained  the  careful- 
ness of  the  sub-prior  and  the  anxiety  of  the  Lord  Abbot. 
The  visitor  answered  that  his  home  was  at  Lutterworth, 
and  showed  that,  in  spite  of  all  Wycliffite  influences,  he 
was  ignorant  and  superstitious,  and  possessed  an  awful 
sense  of  the  obsequious  regard  which  he  ought  to  show 
to  a  Benedictine  friar  at  Glastonbury  Abbey. 

Fra  Giovanni  had  been  very  dull  of  late ;  but  this 
chance  for  entertainment  at  the  visitor's  expense  was  too 
good  to  lose. 

"  I  hold  myself  able,"  said  he  to  Abbot  Richard,  "  in- 
deed, I  am  willing,  so  to  entertain  the  visitor  who  has 
come  from  the  heretical  atmosphere  breathed  by  John 
Wycliffe,  that  he  will  go  back  emptied  of  all  local  pride, 
and  made  humble  before  the  sacredness  of  this  venerable 
abbey." 

The  idea  impressed  the  abbot  as  a  good  one.  Truly, 
the  days  of  hope  for  stalwart  Churchmanship  were  not 
numbered,  so  long  as  Giovanni  would  undertake  vol- 
untarily to  undo  what  the  Lollard  influence  had  done  at 
Lutterworth  within  the  mind  of  this  somewhat  pompous 
visitor,  Thomas  Jenson. 

"  Set  about  it,  with  my  desire  and  blessing.  He  is  here 
to  treat  concerning  the  novice,  Vian.  I  am  beset  with 
heavy  cares.  I  do  not  trust  his  laxity  of  doctrine.  He 
is  full  of  unwise  conceit  of  Lutterworth,"  was  the  grateful 
reply  of  the  head  of  Glastonbury. 

"  I  will  extract  the  whole  of  Lutterworth  from  him," 
promised  Giovanni. 

Now  Giovanni  had  determined  to  attack  this  problem 
through  those  immense  trunk-hose,  which  he  believed 
were  stuffed  with  wool.  The  Lord  Abbot  supposed  that 


1 64  MONK  AND  KNIGHT. 

the  Italian  monk  meant  to  proceed  through  Thomas 
Jensen's  head  or  heart.  The  name,  Thomas  Jenson, 
flew  from  monk  to  monk  with  astonishing  rapidity  j  and 
every  monk  smiled,  when  it  was  known  that  Fra  Giovanni 
proposed  to  show  to  the  ploughman  from  Lutterworth  the 
sights  of  the  abbey. 

"  I  will  take  the  local  pride  out  of  him,"  said  Giovanni. 

Visiting  the  House  of  Parliament,  under  the  invitation 
or  command  of  Abbot  Richard  Beere,  several  of  the 
monks  had  seen  the  posts  placed  in  the  walls  which  up- 
held a  sort  of  scaffold,  upon  which  those  were  accustomed 
to  sit  who  wore  these  great  breeches.  Giovanni  had 
been  informed  that  sometimes  they  were  rilled  with  saw- 
dust or  with  bran;  and  he  determined,  at  the  proper 
moment,  to  pierce  one  of  Thomas  Jensen's  hose,  not  to 
reduce  its  compass,  but  to  take  the  local  pride  out  of 
him.  That  proper  moment  had  arrived. 

Standing  in  front  of  the  abbey  clock,  which  had  suffi- 
ciently excited  the  wonder  of  the  stranger  from  Lutter- 
worth, the  humorous  monk  explained  to  him  that  the 
Devil  loved  to  ensnare  a  victim  whom  he  might  catch 
exhibiting  undue  curiosity  in  sacred  places ;  that  no  one 
who  had  ever  absolutely  obeyed  the  instructions  which 
Giovanni  was  about  to  impart  had  ever  lost  his  soul  in 
that  way ;  that,  on  the  other  hand,  others  who  had  dis- 
dained such  advice  had  become  the  prey  of  the  Evil  One  ; 
and  that,  to  be  specific,  those  who  desired  to  behold  the 
glories  of  the  abbey  must  on  no  account  look  backward. 
"  We  gain  heaven,"  said  the  monk,  in  pious  tone,  "  in 
looking  forward  and  upward." 

Giovanni  had  punctured  the  breeches.  A  small  hole 
was  left  open  in  the  lower  part  of  Thomas  Jenson's  trunk- 
hose.  Bran  began  to  fall  upon  the  floor  of  the  south 
transept,  in  a  small  but  constant  stream.  Still  did  the 
man  of  Lutterworth  marvel  at  the  splendors  of  this  reli- 
gious house.  Giovanni  now  led  his  victim  through  the 


A    VISITOR  AT  GLASTONBURY.  165 

Chapel  of  St.  Joseph,  leaving  behind  the  visitor  a  stream 
of  bran  five  hundred  and  eighty  feet  in  length.  Out 
into  the  cloisters  and  into  the  arcade  they  went,  on  to 
the  east  side,  even  to  the  entrance  of  the  chapter-house, 
where  the  monks  were  assembled  for  confession.  As 
monk  after  monk  afterward  sought  the  ear  of  his  con- 
fessor, that  solemn  individual's  ear  was  astonished  with  a 
burst  of  laughter  from  the  sin-burdened  brother. 

The  Lord  Abbot's  throne  was  immediately  in  front. 
Thomas  Jenson  had  not  looked  behind  him,  though  for 
long  minutes  he  had  been  suffering  agonies  of  distrust 
and  fear.  Giovanni's  face  was  serene.  But  the  Lord 
Abbot  beheld  the  shrunken  visitor,  who,  his  eyes  assured 
him,  was  the  veritable  Thomas  Jenson  of  Lutterworth. 
The  latter  was  perspiring  immoderately,  and  for  a  while 
he  gazed  first  at  the  abbot,  then  toward  Giovanni,  as  if  he 
desired  to  ask  if  it  would  be  perilous  to  remove  the 
sweat-drops  from  his  face,  and  at  length  he  was  piteously 
insisting  that  in  spite  of  the  fact  that  he  had  obeyed 
every  injunction  of  Giovanni's,  the  Devil  had  infested  his 
trunk-hose. 

"  I  did  not  know,"  said  he,  "  that  the  Devil  could  get 
into  such  holy  places." 

For  this  once  Abbot  Richard  dared  publicly  to  cen- 
sure Fra  Giovanni;  but  one  look  from  the  Italian  si- 
lenced the  throne.  Every  monk  laughed ;  and  Fra 
Giovanni  agreed  with  the  Lord  Abbot,  that  if  any  brother 
in  Glastonbury  had  played  the  part  of  Satan  with  Thomas 
Jensen's  breeches,  he  himself  should  see  that  the  culprit 
suffered  severe  flagellation  at  his  hands. 

"  The  local  feeling  has  gone  out  of  him,  at  least  so  far 
as  his  hose  is  concerned,"  said  Giovanni  to  the  sacristan. 
"  I  was  set  to  reduce  his  importance  and  his  impression 
of  himself,  and  to  produce  an  impression  upon  him  of  our 
importance.  I  have  not  succeeded ;  but  I  have  made  it 
impossible  for  any  monk  to  get  the  same  impression 


1 66  MONK  AND  KNIGHT. 

which  he  at  the  first  made  upon  my  innocent  brethren 
in  Glastonbury  Abbey." 

Thomas  Jenson  had  come  to  the  abbey  to  represent 
the  proper  authorities  of  Lutterworth,  and  to  announce 
that  the  property  which  belonged  to  Vian,  under  the  will 
of  his  father,  must  now  be  given  over  to  his  uses,  and 
that  Vian,  with  a  competent  witness  from  Glastonbury, 
must  proceed  to  Lutterworth  and  at  once  conclude  the 
business. 

Thomas  Jenson,  in  other  years,  had  known  Vian's 
father,  and  in  spite  of  his  ignorance,  had  become  one  of 
the  guardians  of  the  property.  It  consisted  of  an  oaken 
box,  containing  many  manuscript  letters,  and  the  books 
which,  in  obedience  to  the  will,  the  other  guardian  had 
purchased. 

Abbot  Richard,  who  himself  had  once  been  a  devotee 
'of  "the  new  learning,"  had  not  a  single  perfectly  ortho- 
dox friar  at  Glastonbury  with  whom  he  dared  to  trust 
what  small  funds  might  thus  pass  into  the  treasury  of  the 
abbey.  His  mind  had  often  remarked  that  the  monks 
of  his  house  who  set  such  store  by  correctness  of  belief, 
were  most  reprehensibly  derelict  in  practice,  and  that 
the  men  of  "  the  new  learning  "  were  both  honest  and 
clean. 

He  chose  as  the  companion  of  Vian,  the  sub- prior, 
who  had  often  served  Abbot  Richard,  though  he  had 
given  him  no  little  trouble  and  cause  for  further  worry, 
because  he  had  allowed  the  brethren  who  could  read  the 
Greek  and  Latin  authors  to  converse  freely  concerning 
what  they  read,  and  to  talk  together  of  well-known  here- 
tics. But  the  sub-prior  was  at  least  honest ;  and  he  was 
trying  to  be  loyal  to  the  traditions  of  Glastonbury  in 
spite  of  his  growing  thought. 

From  the  hour  in  which  Vian  was  torn  from  the 
affectionate  but  temporary  protection  of  Erasmus  and 


A    VISITOR  AT  GLASTONBURY.  l6/ 

Thomas  More,  he  had  never  once  lost  sight  of  a  hope 
bound  up  with  the  life  of  the  famous  Dutch  scholar.  For 
all  these  years  had  his  thoughts  wandered  away  from 
Glastonbury  unto  Erasmus ;  and  when  on  that  May  day 
of  1514,  the  sub-prior  of  the  abbey  was  sent  with  him  on 
the  mission  to  Lutterworth,  Vian  was  delighted  to  find 
out  that  they  were  instructed  also  to  visit  at  the  Univer- 
sity of  Cambridge,  in  order  that  the  sub-prior  might  con 
suit  with  reference  to  the  educatipn  of  certain  young 
men  who  had  been  placed  under  the  care  of  the  abbot. 
There  Vian  knew  he  would  be  accorded  the  privilege 
of  seeing  Erasmus  again. 

Little  did  Abbot  Richard  suspect,  as  he  was  thinking 
that  day  that  for  a  time  at  least  Vian  would  not  be  able 
to  hear  the  heretical  monks  of  Glastonbury  quote  Greek 
and  Latin  odes,  that,  instead,  this  hopeful  child  of  his 
heart  should  overhear  a  conversation  in  Cambridge  which 
was  calculated  to  make  such  an  one  as  he  a  pronounced 
heretic. 

They  had  been  in  Cambridge  three  days,  when  they 
were  asked  into  Queen's  College.  It  seemed  the  edge 
of  heaven  to  Vian,  as,  with  the  sub-prior,  he  waited  for 
a  word  with  the  scholar.  The  eye  of  the  boy  soon 
gazed  upon  the  figure  of  Erasmus,  as  he,  acute  and  self- 
contained  as  he  appears  in  the  etching  of  Van  Dyke, 
rose  to  make  a  correction  in  the  manuscript  which  con- 
tained the  results  of  his  labors  on  the  works  of  Saint 
Jerome,  or  as  he  sat,  as  we  still  may  behold  him  on  the 
canvas  of  Holbein,  holding  in  one  hand  the  pen  with 
which  he  wrote  the  paraphrase  of  Saint  Mark,  and  bear- 
ing upon  the  fingers  of  the  other  an  elaborate  adornment 
of  rings.  His  white  and  delicate  skin  was  not  less  lus- 
trous, because  of  the  dark  yellow  hair  which  fell  about  his 
ears.  His  tireless  blue  eyes  were  set  like  warders  above 
a  face  whose  principal  features  were  a  nose  whose  every 
portion  trembled  with  the  man's  emotion,  or  stood  out 


1 63  MONK  AND  KNIGHT. 

sharply  like  a  sword  keen  as  his  wit,  and  a  mouth  whose 
flexibility  and  power  any  orator  might  have  coveted. 
When  he  spoke,  what  he  said,  and  the  sentences  in  which 
his  ideas  were  expressed,  became  witnesses  of  the  fact 
that  he  was  putting  the  instrumentalities  of  learning  into 
order,  and  that  it  was  possible  that  the  machinery  of 
scholarship  might  soon  be  used  for  loftier  purposes  than 
his  measure  of  courage  should  adopt.  There  was  always 
a  tentative  and  hesitant  tone  in  his  voice.  The  deep 
friendship  of  Erasmus  for  Andreas  Ammonius,  who  was 
the  Pope's  collector  in  England  and  Latin  Secretary  to 
Henry  VIII.,  indicated  how  easily  eminence  which  shuns 
great  crises  seeks  the  companionship  of  mediocrity. 

Even  the  sub-prior  enjoyed  the  witticisms  of  Erasmus, 
as  they  fell  unsparingly  upon  cardinals  and  monks. 

"  My  good  friend  here,"  said  Erasmus,  pointing  to  the 
secretary  of  the  king,  "  has  provided  me  with  better 
wine.  I  dislike  the  beer  of  Cambridge  as  much  as  your 
Lord  Abbot  dislikes  the  sermons  of  Master  John  Colet. 
But  the  wine  of  Glastonbury  and  Colet's  sermons  need 
no  praise  of  mine." 

Erasmus  was  quite  safe  in  the  hands  of  the  sub-prior ; 
for  since  the  accession  of  the  latter  to  that  eminence, 
and  through  the  influence  of  Fra  Giovanni  and  the 
"  Praise  of  Folly,"  this  worthy  dignitary  had  grown  quite 
liberal  in  his  views  as  to  the  work  of  Dr.  John  Colet, 
and  he  was  almost  convinced  that  the  Church  was  about 
to  pass  through  a  reformation  or  a  revolution. 

Andreas  Ammonius,  who  had  begun  life  as  an  apostolic 
notary,  was  only  a  well- furnished  and  intelligent  Italian 
who  kept  Erasmus  from  certain  embarrassments  attend- 
ant upon  dwelling  in  the  unfurnished  apartments  of  the 
Augustinians  when  he  came  to  London.  His  mind  acted 
as  a  foil  to  the  intellect  of  the  stronger  man.  As  secre- 
tary for  the  king  in  the  Latin  tongue,  and  a  friend  of  the 
scholar,  he  labored,  often  with  a  zeal  which  went  far 


A    VISITOR  AT  GLASTONBURY.  169 

beyond  wisdom,  to  bind  together  in  common  affection 
the  Dutch  scholar  and  the  king's  greatest  man,  Thomas 
Wolsey. 

To  the  Italian  mind  it  seemed  remarkable  that  two 
such  powerful  spirits  should,  as  often  as  they  met,  ap- 
pear as  eagerly  to  avoid  a  friendship.  To  each  of  these, 
however,  for  whom  he  labored  in  vain,  it  was  evident 
that  such  an  affection  as  he  proposed  was  impossible. 
Wolsey  was  pre-eminently  a  man^  of  affairs  ;  Erasmus 
was  a  scholar.  Wolsey  considered  Oxford  as  a  means  to 
an  end ;  Erasmus  looked  upon  every  Cambridge  as  an 
end  in  itself.  Wolsey,  born  of  the  democracy,  was  sure 
to  become  an  aristocrat,  even  an  autocrat.  Erasmus, 
born  an  aristocrat  in  ability  and  trained  to  be  almost  an 
autocrat  in  the  walks  of  learning,  had  already  broken  in 
upon  the  exclusion  of  arrogant  and  learned  pretence 
with  desolating  power.  The  Renaissance  with  Erasmus 
was  at  first  a  quiver  of  lightnings  with  which  he  had 
dared  to  play  in  the  vicinity  of  masses  of  inflammable 
material  which  had  been  gathered  together  in  the  course 
of  long  centuries  in  the  history  of  State  and  Church.  At 
the  first  instant  of  their  appearance,  Wolsey  had  seen  that 
each  bolt  was  as  full  of  fire  as  of  light.  He  was  willing 
to  use  both  the  light  and  the  fire,  —  the  one  to  illuminate 
a  path  to  the  highest  position ;  the  other  to  burn  away,  if 
necessary,  every  obstacle  in  that  path.  Neither  he  nor 
the  foreigner  who  had  come  into  Henry's  realm  with  so 
much  of  revolution  in  his  words  had  comprehended  the 
moral  aspects  which  so  soon  portray  themselves  in  every 
intellectual  movement.  The  Chancellor  was  to  hold 
back,  if  possible,  the  causes  of  a  moral  revolution ;  the 
scholar  was  to  control,  if  possible,  the  effects  sure  to 
proceed  from  those  causes.  One  was  to  die  at  last  with 
the  shadow  of  the  throne  upon  his  soul ;  the  other  was 
to  die  with  the  gigantic  upheaval  which  he  had  helped  to 
initiate,  hurling  his  repressive  conservatism  into  the  air. 


I/O  MONK  AND  KNIGHT. 

"And  so  you  think  that  monastic  institutions  are 
certain  to  pass  into  decay,'1  said  the  sub-prior  of 
Glastonbury. 

Vian  listened  with  the  ears  of  a  Wycliffite. 

"  I  should  not  be  a  monk  leading  a  secular  life,  other- 
wise," replied  Erasmus,  who  at  that  moment  also  re- 
minded Ammonius,  who  had  remarked  on  his  dress,  that 
long  ago  he  had  been  allowed  to  abandon  his  monkish 
habit,  and  that,  in  obedience  to  the  desires  of  the  Bishop 
of  Utrecht,  he  clung  to  the  white  linen  scapulary  which 
fell  over  the  cassock  and  was  crowned  with  a  black 
hood. 

Not  the  dress  but  the  remark  of  Erasmus  struck  the 
novice  forcefully.  He  thought  of  the  one  flogging  which 
Abbot  Richard  himself  had  administered  to  him  on  a 
certain  day  when  Giovanni  was  absent,  and  he  could  yet 
see  the  fiery  eyes  of  the  spiritual  lord,  as  the  latter  cried 
out,  "  You  will  never  be  a  good  monk.  The  curse  of 
Saint  Benedict  be  upon  such  a  Benedictine  novice  as 
are  you  !  "  —  and  Vian  remembered  also  that  the  disap- 
pointed old  man  tenderly  embraced  him  afterward,  and 
cried,  as  he  said,  "  I  would  release  you  and  send  you 
to  the  court  of  the  king,  if  I  could  trust  the  heretics 
there." 

Association  with  Erasmus  at  London,  and  his  visits 
to  him  at  Cambridge  had  made  the  secretary  of  the 
king  somewhat  of  a  radical.  He  was  at  least  plain- 
spoken. 

"  There  is  surely  something  else  in  life  for  a  man  such 
as  Vian  will  make,  —  something  beside  a  frock  and  the 
word-mongering  of  unlearned  priests." 

The  remark  of  Ammonius  fell  fruitlessly  upon  the  ears 
of  the  sub-prior,  who  only  stroked  his  ample  chin  and 
sipped  the  excellent  wine.  He  was  wondering  what  Vian 
and  he  would  most  likely  find  in  that  package  of  papers 
at  Lutterworth.  Vian  was  a  promising  scholar,  and  he 


A    VISITOR  AT  GLASTONBURY.  1 71 

was  aware  that  he  himself  was  distressed,  as  he  heard 
this  elder  scholar  talk  in  his  presence  so  freely.  Surely 
Vian  could  not  endure  much  more  heresy  and  remain 
at  Glastonbury.  These  reflections  made  him  glad  that 
Vian  was  absent  from  them  for  the  nonce. 

"Tell  me,"  said  Erasmus,  —  "for  I  have  quite  fallen 
in  love  with  that  novice  Vian,  —  tell  me  of  the  youth's 
culture.  What  can  Glastonbury  Abbey  do  for  such  a 
soul  as  just  awhile  ago  looked  out  at  me  through  those 
calm  eyes  ?  Ah  !  I  do  not  forget  that  Abbot  Richard 
Beere  intended  him  to  be  head  of  the  abbey  by 
and  by." 

The  sub-prior  began  to  reply,  conscious  only  of  the 
difficulties  with  which  life's  way  is  beset,  at  the  moment 
one  stops  to  think  :  "  He  has  been  a  troublesome  novice, 
Master,  a  high-mettled  youth ;  and  no  abbot  can  control 
the  seething  life  of  his  mind,  as  it  overflows  barriers  the 
most  ancient  and  reverend.  He  was  once  the  abbot's 
hope ;  he  is  now  the  abbot's  despair." 

"  Nothing,"  said  Erasmus,  "  nothing  whatever  is  so 
ancient  and  reverend  as  the  human  soul.  Nothing  is 
so  worthy  of  our  despair  as  an  acquiescent  youth  in  an 
abbey." 

Vian  had  come  within  hearing.  Every  word  of  Erasmus 
made  his  breast  lift  with  revolution.  He  was  becoming 
sensitive  to  external  facts  and  their  supremacy  over  him. 
To  hear  what  the  sub-prior  might  say  would  perhaps 
interfere  with  the  working  out  of  his  life's  problem,  by 
the  hands  which  he  had  begun  to  feel  must  undertake 
it  alone.  It  sometimes  seemed  as  if  others  were  living 
his  life  for  him.  He  must  leave  the  overhearing  of  that 
conversation  at  any  sacrifice. 

"  Abbeys,  great  men  and  small  men,  revivals  of  learn- 
ing, reforms,  changes,  —  these  are  huge,  inconceivably 
great  or  little,"  thought  he.  "  They  are  tossing  me 
about  every  whither,  and  it  may  be  that  through  all  my 


MONK  AND  KNIGHT. 

life  they  will  toss  me  about.  But  hereafter  I  shall 
at  least  keep  my  feet  under  me  and  the  open  sky  above 
me." 

As  Erasmus  spoke,  Vian  was  listening ;  and  as  the 
novice  recollected  that  episode  in  the  abbey,  it  occurred 
to  him,  for  the  first  time,  that  perhaps  a  secular  life 
would  be  his  good  fortune  by  and  by. 

"  Not  a  great  man  in  scholarship  or  in  ecclesiastics 
has  come  forth  from  an  abbey  in  many  years.  Abbot 
Richard  Beere  coming  up  to  Parliament  with  a  splendid 
army  is  to-day  a  reminiscence  of  a  bygone  age.  The 
Church  is  dealing  with  the  length  of  men's  beards,  in- 
stead of  those  important  changes  which  are  forcing  them- 
selves upon  her.  The  people  will  not  always  pay  pence 
or  listen  to  Mass  so  uncomplainingly.  Ah,  child,  —  no, 
a  young  man  you  are  now,  as  I  see,  —  I  remember  you 
on  the  dusty  roadway.  What  have  you  read  ?  " 

"The  'Praise  of  Folly,'"  said  Vian,  quietly,  —  "  the 
'Praise  of  Folly,'  Master,  and  some  other  books." 

Erasmus  shrugged  his  shoulders,  and  the  sub-prior  was 
quite  unnerved.  He  had  not  hitherto  suspected  Fra 
Giovanni's  complete  treachery  to  Abbot  Richard  Beere. 
The  one  book  which  Vian  had  been  prevented  from  see- 
ing, so  thought  Abbot  Richard  and  the  sub-prior  here 
present,  — indeed  so  promised  Fra  Giovanni,  — was  the 
"  Praise  of  Folly,"  by  Erasmus. 

"  We  must  hasten  on,"  said  the  sub-prior,  strangely 
connecting  in  his  thought  the  book  mentioned  with  the 
packet  of  papers  at  Lutterworth  which  at  this  age,  by 
the  dictate  of  his  father's  will,  Vian  was  to  receive,  in 
addition  to  the  Caxton  and  Aldine  books  which  had  been 
purchased  for  him,  according  to  that  testament.  "  We 
must  hasten  to  Lutterworth.  Our  stay  here  has  been 
only  too  long.  I  have  come  to  observe  the  course  of 
certain  youths  who  are  being  taught  here,  and  are  under 
the  control  of  our  worthy  abbot.  I  fear,  Master  Eras- 


A    VISITOR  AT  GLASTONBURY.  173 

mus,  that  if  Abbot  Richard  Beere  knew  that  you  had 
spoken  thus  before  such  a  youth,"  placing  his  hand 
upon  the  stool  upon  which  Vian  had  been  sitting,  and 
from  which  he  had  just  vanished,  "  he  would  consider 
them  worthy  of  safer  surroundings." 

"  I  have  been  made  to  feel  that  nothing  is  as  safe  as 
truth,"  thought  Vian,  who  stood  without,  near  the  open 
window,  and  looked  up  into  the  infinite  solitude  of  the 
blue  sky. 

A  moment  more  and  he  had  silently  walked  away,  and 
reaching  the  close  shade  by  a  well-worn  path,  he  had 
seated  himself  beneath  a  young  elm,  to  find  his  boyhood's 
vision  stealing  over  his  soul. 

Meanwhile  the  sub-prior  was  attempting  to  enlighten 
Erasmus  concerning  the  short  and  disappointing  career 
of  Vian  at  Glastonbury. 

"  As  I  have  said,  he  was  almost  unruly  in  his  thoughts, 
and  he  would  have  avoided  many  pains  for  himself  and 
those  who  loved  him  well,  if  he  hacl  kept  his  thoughts 
to  himself." 

"  The  only  hope  of  age  is  that  youth  will  not  and  can- 
not keep  its  thoughts  to  itself,"  suggested  the  scholar. 

"  I  would  not  have  you  think  of  him  as  an  ill-bred  and 
rebellious  novice,"  pursued  the  sub-prior.  "On  the 
other  hand,  no  one  could  surpass  him  in  external  obedi- 
ence. He  outwardly  took  leave  of  every  relative  —  " 

"  Except,  perhaps,  the  ghost  of  that  Wyclifiite  father." 

"  Yes,  except  that  heretical  father,  whom  he  has  in  his 
very  blood." 

"  I  could  see  it  in  his  dislike  of  monasticism,"  said 
Erasmus. 

"  Even  Abbot  Richard  has  had  to  yield  before  that 
dead  man  oftentimes.  But  the  lad  has  bowed  with 
reverence  to  the  command  of  the  master  of  novices, 
learning  so  rapidly,  however,  that  he  has  often  made  him 
to  bow  unto  his  youth  —  " 


1/4  MONK  AND  KNIGHT. 

"  And  to  regard  him  as  heretical,  I  doubt  not,  because 
he  knew  more  than  his  teacher.  That  is  the  way  of  the 
world." 

"  Even  so  !  I  believe  it,  for  I  count  not  Vian  among 
the  young  heretics,  although,  like  myself,  he  reads  many 
forbidden  books.  He  is  an  industrious  novice,  and  has 
never  refused  a  mortification  or  a  labor ;  oftener  has  he 
labored  at  studies  beyond  his  years.  Fra  Giovanni  has 
taught  him  Italian." 

At  this  point  Andreas  Ammonius  withdrew ;  and  almost 
before  the  sub-prior  had  begun  another  sentence  with 
Erasmus,  the  Latin  secretary  had  broken  in  upon  Vian's 
dream  with  a  question  spoken  in  Italian,  and  had  found 
himself  engaged  with  an  accomplished  young  linguist. 

"That  Andreas,  best  of  good  fellows,  has  gone  to 
try  his  Italian,"  said  Erasmus.  "  Proceed ;  your  story 
interests  me." 

"  Pacing  the  cloisters,  as  one  would  to  search  for  talent, 
no  manlier  novice  could  be  found.  But  Vian  never 
seems  to  have  found  happiness.  If  achievement  in 
scholarship  were  joy,  he  would  be  most  joyous.  He  has 
translated  '  The  King  and  the  Monk  Compared,'  from 
Saint  John  Chrysostom,  from  Greek  into  Latin ;  and  al- 
though our  abbot  dislikes  Greek,  even  in  the  Fathers, 
he  rejoiced  at  Vian's  accomplishment.  Three  years  in 
the  abbey,  and  now  his  second  in  the  novitiate,  he  knows 
as  much  as  the  eldest,  of  the  higher  studies.  He  is 
always  hearing  Abbot  Richard  piteously  repeating  the 
words  of  Saint  Benedict,  —  words  and  tears  mingling  as  he 
remembers  Vian's  Wycliffite  father,  — '  Let  the  abbot  un- 
derstand that  to  the  shepherd  will  the  fault  be  ascribed, 
if,  when  the  father  of  the  family  comes,  any  of  his  sheep 
be  found  missing.  Then  only  shall  he  be  justified,  if 
he  has  given  all  his  care  to  an  indocile  and  refractory 
flock—'  " 

"  Oh,"  remarked  Erasmus,  with  a  trifle  of  impatience, 


A    VISITOR  AT  GLASTONBURY.  175 

"  I  know  all  the  rules.  What  of  the  novice  ?  He  may 
perish  with  all  these  rules.  What  else  has  he  learned?" 

"  He  knows  the  theology  of  the  mystics  and  ecclesias- 
tics and  scholastics  by  heart.  But  I  know  your  opinion 
of  these." 

"  Ah  !  you  may  know  my  opinion.  Even  the  world 
must  know  it,"  said  the  scholar,  warmed  into  a  flame, 
as  he  stood  and  spoke  to  the  sub-prior  as  if  he  would 
lecture  the  theologian  from  Glastonbury. 

At  this  moment  Ammonius  and  Vian  entered,  but 
Erasmus  heeded  not.  "  I  suppose,"  continued  he,  "  that 
no  such  mass  of  useless  persons  ever  existed.  It  might 
be  better  for  me  to  pass  the  divines  by.  They  are  a 
supercilious  and  irritable  race.  If  provoked,  they  may 
rush  upon  me  in  a  body,  armed  with  six  hundred  con- 
clusive arguments,  and  force  me  to  recant.  If  I  refuse, 
they  may  forthwith  raise  the  cry  of  heresy ;  for  that  is 
the  thunder  with  which  they  terrify.  It  is  true  that  there 
are  none  less  willing  to  acknowledge  themselves  depend- 
ent on  my  bounty ;  but  for  all  that  they  are  deeply  in  my 
debt,  as  it  is  I  who  bestow  upon  them  that  self-love  by 
which  they  are  able  to  fancy  themselves  caught  up  to  the 
third  heaven,  and  to  look  down  on  the  rest  of  mankind, 
as  if  they  were  so  many  sheep  feeding  on  the  ground ; 
and  indeed  they  pity  their  miserable  condition,  while 
they  are  themselves  protected  by  so  vast  an  array  of 
magisterial  definitions,  conclusions,  corollaries,  propo- 
sitions implicit  and  explicit,  and  have  so  many  loop- 
holes of  escape,  that  no  chains,  though  they  should  be 
forged  on  the  anvil  of  Vulcan,  can  hold  them  so  fast  but 
they  will  contrive  to  extricate  themselves;  for  which 
purpose  they  are  provided  with  a  number  of  fine  distinc- 
tions with  which  they  can  cut  all  knots  more  easily  than 
the  sharpest  axe,  and  with  a  vast  supply  of  newly  in- 
vented terms  and  words  of  prodigious  length." 

Erasmus    seemed    to    hold   his   breath   through   this 


176  MONK  AND  KNIGHT. 

mighty  sentence.  To  the  sub-prior  it  was  arr  indictment 
which  easily  took  his  breath  away.  Ammonius  looked 
at  it  as  a  sentence  of  judgment,  and  was  transfixed. 
Vian's  face  bore  a  smile ;  but  it  was  not  the  smile  of  silly 
youth,  though  it  half  irritated  the  sub-prior. 

Erasmus  talked  on,  until  the  silence  wearied  him. 
Then,  perceiving  that  he  had  taken  undue  advantage 
of  Abbot  Richard  in  thus  speaking  in  Vian's  presence, 
he  asked  Ammonius  to  show  the  library  to  the  novice. 


CHAPTER   XV. 

A   SHAKING    FAITH. 

There  lives  more  faith  in  honest  doubt, 
Believe  me,  than  in  half  the  creeds. 

TENNYSON, 

"  /HP*ELL  me  more  of  the  novice,"  said  the  scholar. 

JL  When  the  sub-prior  was  sure  of  his  own  tongue, 
he  said,  "Vian  has  mastered  the  decretals  also;  and 
having  learned  canon  law,  he  has  become,  for  one  so 
young,  a  scholar  in  the  civil  law." 

"  That,"  said  Erasmus,  "  has  been  told  me  by  Am- 
monius  himself.  In  his  conversation  of  yesterday  he 
found  the  novice  ready  in  reply.  He  will  tell  the  Lord 
Cardinal  Wolsey  of  this,  I  am  sure." 

The  sub-prior  was  startled  with  the  fancy  that  perhaps 
at  some  distant  day  so  great  a  man  as  Wolsey  would 
require  the  services  of  Vian.  Erasmus  was  more  than 
willing  to  hear  everything  as  to  his  knowledge  of  history 
and  his  love  for  politics  and  statecraft ;  and  it  appeared 
to  the  sub-prior  that  he  chattered  with  a  sort  of  sus- 
picious glee,  as  he  led  the  way  toward  the  greensward 
near  which  Vian  and  Ammonius  were  standing. 

Suddenly  stopping,  the  sub-prior  said,  "  I  should  feel 
I  had  wronged  you,  if  I  said  not  that  one  unfortunate 
hallucination  besets  him." 

Erasmus  turned,  and  walking  with  the  sub-prior  back 
VOL.  i.  — 12 


1 78  MONK  AND  KNIGHT. 

toward  his  lodgings,  asked,  "Has  he  ever  seemed 
mad?" 

"  Not  mad,  Master,  not  even  melancholic.  No.  But 
a  novice  must  not  dream  of  the  other  sex,"  said  the  sub- 
prior,  solemnly. 

"  Is  it  more  wicked  in  a  novice  than  in  a  pope  or  a 
bishop?"  inquired  Erasmus. 

"  Ah,  but  such  a  dream  he  has  had  since  his  childhood. 
Now  and  then  he  is  possessed  by  it." 

"  Would  that  I  had  kept  my  child-dreams  !  "  said  the 
great  scholar. 

"And  I  mine,"  added  the  sub-prior,  as  he  proceeded 
to  tell  Erasmus  of  Vian's  vision. 

Silently  the  scholar  listened ;  and  as  the  moments  flew 
by,  these  two  men  —  full-grown,  and  partly  disillusioned 
by  cares  and  studies,  one  of  whom  had  been  officially 
connected  with  an  institution  which  made  love  unholy 
and  the  marriage  of  souls  an  iniquity,  the  other  of  whom 
was  still  under  the  vows  of  a  monk,  and  yet  a  profound 
student  of  human  nature  —  abandoned  themselves  to  the 
luxury  of  Vian's  beautiful  dream,  took  up  into  their  own 
imagined  experiences  this  sweet  vision  of  the  novice ; 
and  so  they  travelled  hand  in  hand,  as  children  grown 
old,  wandering  with  the  youth's  glad  feet  over  the  soft 
grasses  of  Lutterworth  and  across  its  streams,  sitting 
down  on  the  thymy  banks  with  Vian's  little  mate,  hearing 
them  utter  to  each  other  their  tender  vows,  while  the 
nightingale  fluttered  and  the  lark  slept,  beholding  the 
innocent  rapture  of  their  hearts  as  they  walked  over 
the  meadow  orchis  and  the  blue  veronica,  for  very  joy 
gathering  cranesbill  and  white  violets  to  strew  the  turf 
withal  beneath  the  wide  beeches,  —  there  they  lived, 
loveless,  unloved,  in  a  boy's  dream,  until  tears  hung  like 
livid,  fiery  protests  against  the  monkish  life  which  denied 
the  sacredness  of  such  a  vision. 

The  scheming  and  solitary  Ammonius  soon  returned, 


A   SHAKING  FAITH  179 

and  at  once,  but  altogether  unconsciously,  changed  the 
direction  which  the  conversation  had  been  taking.  He 
had  found  a  companion  in  Vian,  and  was  full  of  a  politi- 
cian's plans,  to  the  proposal  of  which  the  sub-prior  and 
Erasmus  replied  not.  "  No  youth  in  England,"  said  the 
secretary,  "  will  so  ably  support  the  cardinal  in  his  con- 
version of  the  monasteries  into  colleges;  "  and  the  mo 
ments  passed  by  rapidly,  as  they  talked  about  all  possible 
careers  for  young  men  in  England.  . 

This  conversation  bore  sufficient  testimony  to  the  feel- 
ings which  possessed  such  minds  at  that  hour.  England, 
like  France  and  Germany,  had  already  been  transformed 
by  the  Renaissance.  Each  seemed  to  foresee  the  changes 
consequent  upon  a  finer  consciousness,  on  the  part  of  the 
common  people,  of  their  own  social  and  intellectual  im- 
portance, and  a  less  generous  estimate  of  the  ecclesiasti- 
cal aristocracy,  which  consciousness  and  estimate  were  to 
come  in  with  this  sort  of  reform. 

Vian  supposed  that  by  this  time  all  conversation  per- 
taining to  himself  had  been  abandoned,  and  that  it  would 
be  perfectly  proper  for  him,  without  a  word  of  announce- 
ment, to  walk  into  the  apartment  of  Queen's  College 
which  he  had  left  so  suddenly. 

As  he  came  up  the  well-worn  walk  and  was  about  to 
enter  the  room,  the  laugh  of  Ammonius,  hearty  and  yet 
hesitant,  as  if  obstructed  by  an  uncongenial  atmosphere, 
broke  upon  his  ears.  Little  did  Vian  know  what  the 
excellent  sub-prior  had  been  suffering  while  Erasmus  had 
been  giving  a  few  hints  of  his  visit  to  the  shrine  of  Our 
Lady  of  Walsingham. 

This  dignitary  from  Glastonbury  had  found  it  impossi- 
ble to  accede,  by  so  much  as  a  smile,  to  a  theory  of  saints 
and  shrines  which  he  had  begun  to  feel  was  the  true  one. 
He  saw  that  if  he  laughed  outright,  having  more  con- 
science and  less  intellect  than  Erasmus,  his  own  soul 
could  not  occupy  the  standpoint  of  the  Dutch  scholar, 


ISO  MONK  AND  KNIGHT. 

and  most  likely  would  go  over  to  the  Reformers.  And 
then  he  was  on  his  way  to  Lutterworth,  the  old  home  of 
John  Wycliffe  !  And  Vian,  —  Vian  might  hear  him  laugh. 

While  he  struggled,  Erasmus  proceeded  with  the  story, 
much  as  he  has  told  it  to  the  world  of  readers  in  the 
"Familiar  Colloquies,"  to  the  infinite  amusement  of  Am- 
monius  within,  and  to  the  great  interest  of  Vian,  who  still 
stood  without ;  also  to  the  total  discomfiture  of  the  vacil- 
lating sub-prior,  who  did  not  know  where  he  was ;  who 
however  wished  he  was  on  the  road  to  Lutterworth  with 
Vian. 

"  I  was  trying  to  be  worshipful  as  any  monk.  I  in- 
tended to  go  and  pray  for  the  triumph  of  the  Holy 
League.  Indeed,  I  was  ready  to  hang  up  what  I  knew  no 
monk  would  be  likely  to  be  able  to  read,  —  a  votive  offer- 
ing, a  Greek  ode.  Thinking  I  might  not  be  sufficiently 
pious,  I  asked  Robert  Aldridge  to  accompany  me.  We 
arrived  as  the  winds  were  sighing  through  the  windows, 
and  the  tapers  burned  brightly  above  the  shrine,  which 
was  covered  with  costly  ornaments.  There  stood  the 
greedy  canon  at  the  altar,  watching  for  thieves  with  one 
eye  and  estimating  the  value  of  everybody's  gift  with  the 
other.  Now  you  know  that  saints  never  grow  old,  and 
so  I  was  not  surprised  to  see  Saint  James  looking  so 
young.  He  looked  a  little  disturbed,  however,  —  the 
great  apostle  that  used  to  glitter  with  gold  and  jewels, 
now  brought  to  the  very  block  that  he  is  made  of,  having 
scarce  a  tallow  candle.  The  Virgin  Mary,  you  know, 
being  of  stone,  has  written  a  letter  objecting  to  such 
neglect  as  will  expose  all  the  saints  to  the  danger  of  com- 
ing to  the  same  pass.  She  puts  the  blame  upon  the 
Reformers,  who  think  it  a  thing  altogether  needless  to 
invoke  saints.  It  has  always  amused  me  to  see  her 
stand  there  so  unconcerned,  while  a  pilgrim  pretending 
to  lay  one  gift  on  the  altar,  by  some  sleight  of  hand  steals 
what  another  has  laid  down. 


A   SHAKING  FAITH.  iSl 

"  At  the  north  side  there  was  a  certain  gate,  —  not  of  a 
church,  don't  mistake  me,  but  of  the  wall  that  encloses 
the  churchyard,  that  has  a  very  little  wicket,  as  in  the 
great  gates  of  noblemen,  —  that  he  that  has  a  mind  to  get 
in,  must  first  venture  the  breaking  of  his  shins  and  after- 
ward stoop  his  head  too. 

"  But  yet  the  verger  told  me  that  some  time  since,  a 
knight  on  horseback  having  escaped  out  of  the  hands  of 
his  enemy,  who  followed  him  at  the  heels,  got  in  through 
this  wicket.  The  poor  man  at  the  last  pinch,  by  a  sud- 
den turn  of  thought,  recommended  himself  to  the  Holy 
Virgin  that  was  the  nearest  to  him.  For  he  resolved  to 
take  sanctuary  at  her  altar  if  the  gate  had  been  open, 
when  behold,  which  is  such  a  thing  as  was  never  heard 
of,  both  man  and  horse  were  on  a  sudden  taken  into  the 
churchyard  and  his  enemy  left  on  the  outside  of  it,  stark 
mad  at  his  disappointment. 

"  Toward  the  east,"  continued  Erasmus,  without  a 
smile,  "  there  is  another  chapel  full  of  wonders  ;  thither 
I  went.  Another  verger  received  me.  There  we  prayed 
a  little ;  and  there  was  shown  us  the  middle  joint  of  a 
man's  finger.  I  kissed  it,  and  asked  whose  relic  it  was. 
He  told  me  it  was  Saint  Peter's.  <  What ! '  said  I,  '  the 
apostle  ?  '  He  said  it  was.  I  then  took  notice  of  the 
bigness  of  the  joint,  which  was  large  enough  to  be  taken 
for  that  of  a  giant.  Upon  which  said  I,  «  Peter  must 
needs  have  been  a  very  strong  man.'  At  this,  one  of  the 
company  fell  a  laughing.  I  was  very  much  vexed  at  it, 
for  if  he  had  held  his  tongue,  the  verger  would  have 
shown  us  all  the  relics.  However,  we  pacified  him  pretty 
well,  by  giving  him  a  few  groats.  Before  this  little  chapel 
stood  a  house,  which  he  told  us,  in  the  winter-time  when 
all  things  were  buried  in  snow,  was  brought  there  on  a 
sudden  from  some  place  a  great  way  off.  Under  this 
house  were  two  pits,  brimful,  that  were  fed  by  a  fountain 
consecrated  to  the  Holy  Virgin.  The  water  was  wonder- 


1 82  MONK  AND  KNIGHT. 

ful  cold,  and  of  great  virtue  in  curing  pains  in  the  head 
and  stomach. 

"  I,  observing  everything  very  diligently,  asked  him 
how  many  years  it  was  since  that  little  house  was  brought 
thither.  He  said  it  had  been  there  for  some  ages. 
<  But,'  said  I,  l  methinks  the  walls  don't  seem  to  carry 
any  marks  of  antiquity  in  them  ! '  He  did  not  much 
deny  it..  *•  Nor  these  pillars,'  said  I.  He  did  not  deny 
but  those  had  been  set  up  lately ;  and  the  thing  showed 
itself  plainly.  'Then,'  said  I,  '  that  straw  and  the  reeds, 
the  whole  thatch  of  it  seems  not  to  have  been  so  long 
laid.'  He  allowed  it. 

"  And  they  tell  us  the  same  stories  about  our  Lord's 
cross,  that  is  shown  up  and  down,  both  publicly  and  pri- 
vately, in  so  many  places  that  if  all  the  fragments  were 
gathered  together  they  would  seem  to  be  sufficient  load- 
ing for  a  good  large  ship;  and  yet  our  Lord  himself 
carried  the  whole  cross  upon  his  shoulders. 

"  I  paid  a  pilgrimage  to  the  shrine  of  Saint  Thomas  a 
Becket.  My  companion  had  read  Wycliffe's  books.  It  is 
one  of  the  most  religious  pilgrimages  in  the  world. 

"  Iron  grates  enclose  the  place  called  the  choir,  so  that 
there's  no  entrance,  but  so  that  the  view  is  still  open 
from  one  end  of  the  church  to  the  other.  You  ascend  to 
this  by  a  great  many  steps,  under  which  there  is  a  certain 
vault  that  opens  to  a  passage  to  the  north  side.  There 
they  show  a  wooden  altar  consecrated  to  the  Holy  Vir- 
gin. It  is  a  very  small  one,  and  remarkable  for  nothing 
except  as  a  monument  of  antiquity,  reproaching  the  lux- 
ury of  the  present  times.  In  that  place  the  good  man  is 
reported  to  have  taken  his  last  leave  of  the  Virgin  when 
he  was  at  the  point  of  death.  Upon  the  altar  is  the 
point  of  the  sword  with  which  the  top  of  the  head  of  that 
good  prelate  was  wounded,  and  some  of  his  brains  that 
were  beaten  out  to  make  sure  work  of  it.  We  most 
religiously  kissed  the  sacred  rust  of  this  weapon,  out  of 


A   SHAKING  FAITH.  183 

love  to  the  martyr.  Leaving  this  place,  we  went  down 
into  a  vault  under  ground ;  to  that  there  belonged  two 
showers  of  relics.  The  first  thing  they  show  you  is  the 
skull  of  the  martyr  as  it  was  bored  through :  the  upper 
part  is  left  open  to  be  kissed  ;  all  the  rest  is  covered  over 
with  silver.  There  also  is  shown  you  a  leaden  plate  with 
this  inscription,  *  Thomas  Acrensis.'  And  there  hang  up 
in  a  great  place  the  shirts  of  hair-cloth,  the  girdles  and 
breeches,  with  which  this  prelate  used  to  mortify  his  flesh, 
the  very  sight  of  which  is  enough  to  strike  one  with  horror 
and  to  reproach  the  effeminacy  and  delicacy  of  our  age. 

"  From  hence  we  returned  to  the  choir.  On  the  north 
side  they  opened  a  private  box.  It  is  incredible  what  a 
world  of  bones  they  brought  out  of  it,  —  skulls,  chins,  teeth, 
hands,  fingers,  whole  arms ;  all  of  which  we  having  first 
adored,  kissed.  Nor  had  there  been  any  end  of  it,  had 
it  not  been  for  one  of  my  fellow-travellers,  who  indis- 
creetly interrupted  the  officer  that  was  showing  them  all. 

"  He  was  an  Englishman ;  his  name  was  Master  John 
Colet,  —  a  man  of  learning  and  piety,  as  you  know,  but  not 
so  well  affected  to  this  part  of  religion  as  I  could  wish  he 
were  for  the  comfort  of  Abbot  Richard  Beere.  He  took 
out  an  arm  having  yet  some  bloody  flesh  upon  it;  he 
showed  a  reluctance  to  the  kissing  of  it,  and  a  sort  of 
uneasiness  in  his  countenance ;  and  presently  the  officer 
shut  up  all  his  relics  again.  After  this  we  viewed  the 
table  of  the  altar  and  the  ornaments  :  all  was  very  rich  ; 
you  would  have  said  Midas  and  Croesus  were  beggars 
compared  to  them,  if  you  had  beheld  the  great  quantities 
of  gold  and  silver. 

"  After  this  we  were  carried  to  the  vestry.  Good 
Lord  !  what  a  pomp  of  silken  vestments  was  there,  of 
golden  candlesticks  !  There  we  saw  also  Saint  Thomas's 
pastoral  staff.  It  looked  like  a  reed  plated  over  with  sil- 
ver ;  it  had  but  little  of  weight  and  nothing  of  workman- 
ship, and  was  no  longer  than  up  to  one's  girdle. 


1 84  MONK  AND  KNIGHT. 

"  In  a  certain  chapel  there  was  shown  to  us  the  whole 
face  of  the  good  man,  set  in  gold  and  adorned  with  jew- 
els; and  here  a  certain  unexpected  chance  had  near 
interrupted  all  our  felicity. 

"  My  friend  Colet  lost  himself  here  extremely.  After 
a  short  prayer  he  says  to  the  assistant  of  him  that  showed 
us  the  relics :  '  Good  father,  is  it  true,  as  I  have  heard, 
that  Thomas,  while  he  lived,  was  very  charitable  to  the 
poor?'  'Very  true,'  replies  he;  and  he  began  to 
relate  a  great  many  instances  of  his  charity.  '  Then,' 
answered  Colet,  '  I  don't  believe  that  good  inclination  in 
him  is  changed  unless  it  be  for  the  better.'  The  officer 
assented.  '  Then,'  says  he  again,  '  if  this  holy  man  was 
so  liberal  to  the  poor,  when  he  was  a  poor  man  himself, 
and  stood  in  need  of  charity  for  the  support  of  his  own 
body,  don't  you  think  he  would  take  it  well  now  when  he 
is  grown  so  rich  and  wants  nothing,  if  some  poor  woman 
having  a  family  of  childien  at  home  ready  to  starve, 
or  daughters  in  danger  of  being  under  a  necessity  to 
prostitute  themselves  for  want  of  portions,  or  a  husband 
sick  in  bed  and  destitute  of  all  comforts,  —  if  such  a  woman 
should  ask  him  leave  to  make  bold  with  some  small  por- 
tion of  these  vast  riches  for  the  relief  of  her  family,  tak- 
ing it  either  as  by  consent,  or  by  gift,  or  by  way  of 
borrowing  ?  '  The  assistant  making  no  answer  to  this, 
Colet  being  a  warm  man,  '  I  am  fully  persuaded,'  says 
he,  '  that  the  good  man  would  be  glad  at  his  heart  that 
when  he  is  dead  he  could  be  able  to  relieve  the  necessi- 
ties of  the  poor  with  his  wealth.'  Upon  this  the  shower 
of  the  relics  began  to  frown,  and  to  pout  his  lips,  and  to 
look  upon  us  as  if  he  would  have  eaten  us  up ;  and  I 
don't  doubt  but  he  would  have  spit  in  our  faces  and 
have  turned  us  out  of  the  church  by  the  neck  and  shoul- 
ders but  that  we  had  the  archbishop's  recommendation. 

"  Again  my  John  Colet  behaved  himself  in  none  of  the 
most  obliging  manners.  For  the  gentle  prior  offered  to 


A   SHAKING  FAITH.  185 

him,  being  an  Englishman,  an  acquaintance,  and  a  man 
of  considerable  authority,  one  of  the  rags  for  a  present, 
thinking  he  had  presented  him  with  a  very  acceptable 
gift ;  but  Colet  unthankfully  took  it  squeamishly  in  his 
fingers,  and  laid  it  down  with  an  air  of  contempt,  making 
up  his  mouth  at  it  as  if  he  would  have  smacked  it.  For 
it  was  his  custom  if  anything  came  in  his  way  that  he 
would  express  his  contempt  to.  I  was  both  ashamed  and 
afraid.  Nevertheless  the  good  prior,  though  not  insensi- 
ble of  the  affront,  seemed  to  take  no  notice  of  it,  and 
after  he  had  civilly  entertained  us  with  a  glass  of  wine, 
dismissed  us,  and  we  went  back  to  London." 

Poor  Vian  was  discovered  by  the  sub-prior,  listening. 

He  was  surely  in  a  most  pitiable  condition  of  mind  to 
use  for  the  developing  of  his  faith  the  air  of  Lutterworth, 
to  which  town  the  sub-prior  now  insisted  they  should  go 
as  soon  as  possible. 


CHAPTER  XVI. 

AT   LUTTERWORTH   AGAIN. 

But  rich  was  he  of  holy  thought  and  work. 

He  also  was  a  learned  man  —  a  clerk. 

That  Christ's  gospel  truely  would  preach, 

His  parishens  devoutly  would  he  teach. 

Benign  he  was,  and  wondrous  diligent, 

And  in  adversity  full  patient ; 

And  such  he  was  yproved  often  sithes, 

Full  loth  were  him  to  answer  for  his  tithes, 

But  rather  would  he  given,  out  of  doubt, 

Unto  his  poor  parishioners  about 

Of  his  offering,  and  eke  of  his  substance. 

He  could  in  little  thing  have  suffisance. 

Wide  was  his  parish,  and  houses  far  assunder. 

But  he  ne  left  nought  for  ne  rain  nor  thunder. 

In  sickness  and  in  mischief,  to  visit 

The  farthest  in  his  parish,  much  and  lit, 

Upon  his  feet,  and  in  his  hand  a  staff. 

This  noble  example  to  his  sheep  he  yaf, 

That  first  he  wrought,  and  afterwards  he  taught. 

CHAUCER:  Canterbury  Tales. 

AS  on  horseback  the  sub-prior  and  Vian  travelled 
across  Northampton  toward  Lutterworth,  the  former 
tried  in  vain,  for  the  sake  of  the  abbot,  to  whom  he  had 
pledged  his  faith,  to  revive  Vian's  interest  in  the  scho- 
lastic theology.  But  the  summer-time  was  more  elo- 
quent to  this  poetic  youth  than  either  Scotus  Erigena 
or  the  sentences  of  Peter  Lombard.  The  sub-prior 
knew  that  scholasticism  was  once  a  most  needed  revival 
of  intellectual  life ;  and  he  was  sure  that  Vian's  love 


AT  LUTTERWORTH  AGAIN.  l8/ 

of  free  inquiry  must  honor  such  a  soul  as  Abelard  or 
Thomas  Aquinas.  But  much  as  he  respected  their 
fearlessness  and  power,  he  had  not  a  thread  of  the 
scholastic  in  his  whole  spirit.  Vian  was  a  mystic. 

"  Scholasticism  is  quibbling  about  shadows.  I  prefer 
the  blue  sky  and  the  broad  green  fields.  I  do  not  expect 
anybody  to  explain  them.  I  can  understand  neither.  I 
need  not.  They  are  realities  to  me  ;  and  I  have  a  sense 
of  liberty  with  them." 

There  was  a  snapping  of  chains  in  these  sentences 
which  did  not  wholly  displease  the  sub-prior.  Still  he 
persisted  in  the  discussion  of  the  question  as  to  the 
language  probably  used  by  the  devils  in  hell. 

It  was  difficult  for  the  sub-prior  to  find  an  anchorage 
for  his  own  faith  in  the  religious  feelings.  He  felt  that 
something  must  be  settled,  and  knowing  Vian's  scholar- 
ship, he  sought  to  obtain  with  his  knowledge  a  conclusion 
on  this  topic.  Vian  now  and  then  would  contribute  a 
remark  indicating  his  acquaintance  with  the  struggles 
between  the  "  Greeks  and  Trojans,"  as  the  literary  com- 
batants of  the  time  were  calling  themselves ;  but  his 
attention  constantly  wandered  to  the  turf  at  the  wayside, 
and  the  play  of  shadows  on  the  stream.  Through  all  the 
murky  theologizing  of  his  companion,  his  own  ideas  were 
entangled  with  the  anemones  and  primroses  as  he  saw 
them  struggling  together  with  the  gorse  on  the  side  hills, 
and  the  cowslips  and  celandines  in  the  valleys  below. 

"  No  Pope  Leo  X.  dictates  to  the  bluebells,"  said  he  ; 
"  and  yet  they  are  beautiful,  — beautiful  because  they  are 
free  to  be  true  to  themselves  and  to  Heaven." 

The  sub-prior  felt  that  this  was  only  another  outburst 
of  Vian's  mystical  thought,  —  so  mysterious,  yet  so  fresh 
and  charming  even  to  his  jaded  soul. 

"Think  of  the  flowers  behaving  as  we  do  !  "  proceeded 
the  novice  impatiently,  and  yet  with  a  strain  of  sorrow  in 
his  words.  "  Nay,  rather ;  the  Son  of  God  had  not  said, 


i88  MONK  AND  KNIGHT. 

'  Consider  the  lilies  of  the  field,'  if  they  had  toiled 
and  spun  and  had  corded  themselves  with  unwelcome 
and  coarse  cloth,  or  had  fought  about  tassels,  and  had 
conjured  up  sacred  patterns  of  painful  ugliness,  as  we 
monks  do." 

"  I  told  Erasmus  that  you  had  read  his  '  Praise  of 
Folly,'  "  said  the  sub-prior. 

"  Pardon  me  !  I  myself  told  him  that  piece  of  news,  at 
which  he  shrugged  his  shoulders.  It  appears  plain  to 
me  that  the  mighty  Erasmus  fears  the  consequences  of 
that  humorous  book.  He  is  not  as  brave  as  he  is  keen 
and  learned.  Did  you  think  I  was  then  praising  folly?  " 

At  length  they  were  on  the  bridge  which  in  two  heavy 
arches  crossed  the  Swift,  which,  to  use  Fuller's  oft-quoted 
words,  "conveyed  Wycliffe's  remains  into  the  Avon,  as," 
added  he,  "  Avon  into  the  Severn,  Severn  into  the  narrow 
seas,  they  to  the  main  ocean.  And  thus  the  ashes  of 
Wycliffe  are  the  emblem  of  his  doctrine,  which  is  now 
dispersed  the  world  over." 

The  day,  however,  of  Thomas  Fuller  had  not  yet  ar- 
rived ;  and  even  the  youth,  now  fast  coming  to  his  man- 
hood, who  was  looking  at  that  monument  upon  the  tower 
of  the  old  parish  church,  as  it  rose  above  the  roofs  imme- 
diately in  front,  had  no  thought  that  any  such  ideas  as 
once  occupied  the  mind  of  one  of  his  ancestors  should 
cause  an  open  breach  between  him  and  the  Church. 

"  Let  us  behold  the  books,"  said  the  young  scholar, 
who  had  returned  from  the  churchyard  where  at  last  his 
mother's  dust  peacefully  slumbered  by  the  side  of  that  of 
his  heretical  father.  "  I  would  get  what  God  may  have 
left  for  me  in  this  lonely  parish  of  Lutterworth,  and  then 
depart.  Those  graves  are  farther  apart,  I  trust,  than 
their  souls  be  now." 

The  young  monk's  face  was  filled  with  the  soft  bright 
light  of  the  infinite  daytime,  as  he  looked  up  to  heaven. 


AT  L UTTER WOR TH  AGAIN.  189 

Old  Roger  Fleming,  who  had  been  a  traveller  in  all 
parts  of  Europe,  and  the  friend  of  Vian's  father,  had 
carefully  made  the  purchases  provided  for  in  the  will. 

The  bibliomaniac  of  to-day  feels  a  lively  envy  at  the 
thought  of  the  sight  which  greeted  Vian.  Here,  on 
vellum,  was  the  "  Vision  of  Piers  Plowman,"  an  exquisite 
manuscript,  and  stainless,  save  at  the  page  which  some 
one  had  read  too  often,  —  the  page  which  says  much 
of  the  sins  of  the  clergy  and  the  hope  of  reform. 

"This,"  said  old  Roger,  "was  Master  John  Wycliffe's 
copy.  Those,"  pointing  to  the  marks  upon  the  page, 
"  were  made  by  his  own  hand  when  he  was  master  of 
Balliol.  See  !  he  has  even  placed  the  date  on  the  page." 

The  words  marked  were  :  — 

"  If  possessions  be  poison 
And  imperfect  them  make, 
Good  were  to  discharge  them 
For  holy  church  sake, 
And  purge  them  of  poison 
Ere  more  peril  befall." 

"Ah  !  John  Wycliffe  was  a  prophet,"  said  Vian  to  the 
sub-prior,  who  answered  not. 

"  Here  is  another  page  which  the  master  marked." 
The  aged  Roger  turned  to  the  lines,  — 

"And  yet  shall  come  a  King 
And  confess  you  all 
And  beat  you,  as  the  Bible  telleth, 
For  breaking  of  your  rule, 
And  amend  you  monks  and  monials, 
And  put  you  to  your  penance, 
Ad pristinum  statum  ire. 
And  barons  and  their  bairns 
Blame  you  and  reprove." 

"  Not  in  your  day  or  mine,"  said  Vian  to  the  old  man, 
"shall  these  things  be." 

"  Henry  VIII.  of  England  is  a  brave  and  thoughtful 
sovereign,"  answered  the  aged  Lollard;  his  blue  eyes, 


MONK  AND  KNIGHT. 

which  were  hidden  by  heavy  gray  brows,  looking  out 
with  a  steady  gleam  of  hope.  He  placed  his  finger  on 
the  Latin  word  spes,  which  Wycliffe  had  written  opposite 
these  lines ;  and  the  old  man's  frame  shook,  as  he  said 
with  defiance,  "  Hope  ! " 

The  echo  often  came  back  to  Vian,  —  Hope  ! 

The  old  man  hobbled  away,  as  if  he  had  said  all 
that  he  desired  to  utter,  and  Vian  and  the  sub-prior  were 
left  alone. 

"This  will  never  be  allowed  a  place  in  the  library," 
said  the  sub-prior,  to  whom  Fra  Giovanni  had  one  day 
recited  some  of  the  epigrams,  and  who  now  held  in  his 
hand  "Calderini  (Dom)  Commentorii  in  Martialem." 

The  sub-prior  could  no  longer  conceal  his  joy.  He 
patted  the  thick  small  folio  as  tenderly  as  would  a 
bibliophile  of  modern  days,  opened  to  its  first  page, 
and  found  gold  and  colors  on  the  borders ;  admired  the 
Roman  type,  and  thought  of  the  forty- two  years  which 
had  elapsed  since  the  hour  when,  in  Venice,  it  first  saw 
the  light. 

"  How  will  Erasmus,  if  ever  he  should  visit  Glaston- 
bury  again,  and  if  ever  we  get  this  book  through  the 
gateway,  — how  will  Erasmus  like  this,  think  you?  "  and 
Vian  carried  to  the  sub-prior  the  1477  folio  edition  of 
Lucian's  "  Pharsalia." 

"  Erasmus,  you  say,  is  the  Lucian  of  our  age,"  replied 
the  sub-prior,  in  the  midst  of  the  surprises,  as  he  opened 
to  the  Milanese  designs  which  some  one  had  added  to 
the  titlepage. 

Here  were  copies  of  "  y£sop's  Fables,"  in  leathern  and 
oaken  boards,  printed  also  at  Milan  in  1480  ;  the 
"  Game  And  Playe  of  ye  Chesse,"  which  Caxton  had 
brought  out  in  1474;  the  Aldine  "Horace"  of  1501, 
and  the  "  Dante  "  of  the  next  year,  whose  pages  were 
worn  with  memorials  of  the  student's  interest,  which  man- 
ifested itself  in  significant  lines. 


AT  LUTTERWORTH  AGAIN,  191 

"We  shall  be  overloaded,"  said  the  sub-prior,  who 
added,  "These  are  priceless." 

"  I  am  the  richest  man  in  England,"  said  Vian,  with 
enthusiasm.  "  I  would  be  the  richest  man  if  I  were  not  a 
Benedictine  of  Glastonbury." 

"  But  no  abbot  who  is  in  his  senses  will  allow  these 
books  within  his  holy  precincts." 

The  sub-prior  had  just  found  a  play  of  Terence,  Venice, 
1471  ;  and  a  volume  of  Ovid,  by  Aldus,  1502  ;  also  the 
"Lucretius  "  of  1486. 

"Why  should  Abbot  Richard  object  to  these?"  asked 
Vian.  "  Lucretius  was  no  more  atheistic  than  some  of 
the  cardinals  of  the  Church,  and  the  penny- monks,"  — 
for  so  the  Dominicans  and  Franciscans  who  in  the  four- 
teenth century  wove  buffooneries  and  poor  tales  into 
their  sermons,  were  called.  "They  have  used  '  Gesta  Ro- 
manorum  '  as  a  preacher's  resource  for  long  years.  The 
fables  in  '  Gesta  Romanorum '  are  stolen  from  Ovid  and 
his  like." 

"And  Master  John  Wycliffe  castigated  the  penny- 
monks  with  his  censures  at  Lutterworth  and  Oxford," 
said  old  Roger  Fleming,  who  had  hobbled  back  again, 
carrying  a  little  oaken  chest  whose  weight  did  not  burden 
him. 

"What  have  you  there,  good  man?"  inquired  the 
young  scholar  and  the  sub-prior. 

"  The  most  valuable  treasure  which  your  father  could 
give  you.  Good  friar,  I  know  not  what  you  will  be  able 
to  do  with  it  in  Glastonbury  Abbey  ;  but  here  it  is.  I  have 
done  my  part  in  keeping  it ;  God  help  you  do  your 
part ! " 

There  was  in  the  air  a  strange  feeling  that  they  were 
standing  in  a  holy  place. 

The  monk  knew  not  how  heavy  with  revolutions  was 
that  small  box  which  had  been  so  easily  carried  by  the 
weak  old  man ;  neither  did  the  sub-prior  suspect  that  the 


IQ2  MONK  AND  KNIGHT. 

entrance  of  its  contents  into  Glastonbury  Abbey  could 
make  those  solid  walls  tremble,  in  the  eyes  of  the  breth- 
ren, as  never  any  most  potent  explosives  made  any  city's 
battlements  tremble  under  the  attack  of  a  storming  foe. 
Ideas  alone  are  able  to  dissolve  rock  and  fortress,  and 
yet  leave  them  apparently  untouched.  Beneath  the  ivy 
which  overspreads,  and  within  the  mortar  which  attaches 
the  hugest  stones,  the  potency  of  truth  works  its  quiet 
transformations ;  and  while  men  sleep  within,  the  un- 
troubled solidity  of  the  most  massive  enclosure  has  be- 
come a  monument  or  a  ruin. 

That  box  was  full  of  the  letters  which  John  WyclirTe, 
scholar,  saint,  and  heretic,  had  written  to  Vian's  great- 
grandfather in  the  stormy  years  immediately  preceding 
the  heretic's  death. 


CHAPTER   XVII. 

A   WALDENSIAN   OF   THE    RENAISSANCE. 
"  Post  tenebras  spero  Lucem." 

ON  the  6th  of  June  there  was  joy  at  the  house  of 
Caspar  Perrin,  who  with  Alke  was  occupying  a 
picturesque  habitation  to  which  they  had  removed,  from 
whose  doorway  could  be  heard  the  plash  of  the  torrent 
of  Angrogna,  and  what  is  now  only  the  ruined  fortress 
of  La  Torre  could  be  seen.  It  was  the  anniversary  of 
Alke's  birth ;  and  the  friends  of  the  industrious  cottager 
and  the  admirers  of  his  remarkable  daughter  came  with 
congratulations  for  him  and  kisses  for  her  rosy  lips.  The 
Barbe,  whose  ministerial  duties  lay  in  the  valley  which 
was  protected  by  the  mighty  chain  of  mountains  stretch- 
ing round  about,  had  arranged  to  make  his  annual  visit 
to  Caspar  at  this  time ;  and  the  very  bells  of  the  cattle 
mingling  their  sounds  with  the  music  of  murmuring 
cascades  tinkled  the  gladness  of  the  holiday. 

Alke  had  just  come  in  from  the  field  with  a  large  sheaf 
of  ripe  corn  in  her  arms.  The  golden  beards  almost  out- 
rivalled  her  beautiful  hair  in  delicate  splendor.  The 
broad  leaves  of  rich  green  ivy,  which  half  hid  the  door- 
way in  which  she  stood,  vied  in  depth  of  color  with  her 
dark,  entrancing  eyes.  A  smile  lit  up  Caspar's  face. 
Even  the  unworldly  Barb£  was  impressed  with  the  beauty 
of  the  picture. 
VOL.  i.  — 13 


194  MONK  AND  KNIGHT. 

11  To  what  curious  use  do  you  mean  to  put  the  sheaf 
of  grain?  "  inquired  the  father,  who  had  humored  every 
innocent  whim  of  his  child,  and  whose  pride  in  her  ability 
to  create  a  world  of  beauty  out  of  homely  facts  manifested 
itself  in  his  manner,  and  made  him  quite  oblivious  of  the 
fict  that  they  could  hardly  spare  from  their  poverty  even 
this  much  of  the  harvest  for  the  demands  of  art. 

"  I  am  going  to  show  the  Barb£  how  I  paint  the  illu- 
minations upon  the  parchment.  He  likes  to  see  my 
pretty  pictures ;  and  he  made  me  promise  him,  when  he 
was  last  here,  that  I  should  paint  for  him  when  the  corn 
was  ripe." 

From  Venice  the  father  had  brought  some  acquaint- 
ance with  the  secret  of  staining  vellum  with  what  could 
scarcely  be  distinguished  from  the  true  Tyrian  dye ;  and 
now  Caspar  knew  of  no  one  quite  so  competent  as  was 
Alke  to  outshine  a  monk  as  an  artist  on  parchment,  or  so 
able,  if  need  be,  to  watch  the  goats  in  their  wanderings 
for  food.  He  could  not  forget  a  saying  of  Aldus  Manu- 
tius  :  "  There  is  no  distance  in  a  true  life  between  the  real 
and  the  ideal;  the  practical  and  the  poetical  are  one." 
Alke  had  found  wood  upon  the  mountains,  when  her 
father  was  sick  in  midwinter ;  and  recently  she  had  been 
indulging  the  hope  of  keeping  the  two  from  starvation  by 
selling  secretly,  through  means  into  whose  nature  he 
would  not  inquire,  to  the  monks  of  Turin,  an  elaborately 
painted  but  small  manuscript,  which  the  audacity  of  girl- 
hood had  undertaken. 

"  Ah  !  "  said  the  Barb6,  who  in  spite  of  much  wisdom  was 
a  reflection  of  that  bigotry  so  often  born  of  anti-bigotry, 
"  I  would  not  have  the  child  make  pictures  for  monks." 

"  She  shall  be  permitted  to  keep  the  skeleton  of  pen- 
ury from  her  father's  door,  shall  she  not?" 

The  Barbe  was  convinced  that  Caspar's  strength  of 
tone  had  already  answered  that  question.  Hunger  still 
looked  gaunt  in  the  eye  of  the  peasant. 


A    WALDENSIAN  OF  THE  RENAISSANCE.      195 

"  I  should  not  allow  her  to  paint  such  pictures  as 
adorn  Ave  Marias.  Nor  would  she  be  holding  before  her 
innocent  eyes  even  the  visions  which  such  a  maiden  may 
have  of  saints  and  vigils.  You  answer,  that  she  gets  coin 
from  our  foes?  We  cannot  afford  to  spoil  even  the 
Egyptians  in  this  holy  contest,"  said  the  preacher,  who 
had  heard  that  Caspar's  daughter  was  shrewd  enough  to 
obtain  many  bright  coins  from  the  priests. 

"  There  can  be  no  peril  in  Alke^s  tasks,  for  the  child 
regards  the  saints  as  she  does  the  personages  in  Homer 
and  Virgil,"  answered  Caspar. 

"What  can  she  know  of  Homer  and  Virgil?  "  was  the 
Barbels  instant  query. 

The  proud  father  arose,  went  to  the  little  shelf,  and 
returning,  handed  the  pious  critic  the  Aldine  "  Homer  " 
of  1504,  adding:  "I  set  the  types  for  this  volume.  I 
have  taught  Alke  the  whole  story,  and  she  reads  some 
Greek.  As  for  Virgil,  I  may  have  something  for  you  to 
look  at  some  day,  —  something  which  even  Erasmus 
longed  to  see." 

The  radiant  creature  who  had  meanwhile  arranged  the 
masses  of  corn  and  flowers  so  that  their  appearance  was 
a  piece  of  art,  came  close  to  her  father,  who  held  the 
"  Homer  "  in  his  hand,  put  her  beautiful  arm  about  his 
neck,  pulled  his  rough  face  to  her  soft  lips,  and  kissed 
him. 

"  That  is  nobler  than  painting  upon  a  missal ;  and  the 
act  itself  is  finer  than  any  picture,"  said  the  Barbe",  who 
was  not  yet  pleased  with  Alke's  tasks. 

Alke  had  learned  at  this  very  early  age  what,  if  she 
had  lived  in  a  monastery  and  had  found  more  missals 
to  illuminate,  would  have  been  called  missal-painting. 
Caspar  had  told  her  of  the  wealth  of  exquisite  color  and 
worshipping  affection  which  in  other  centuries  monks 
had  lavished  upon  the  stories  of  saints  and  the  life  of  the 
Saviour.  He  was  not  sufficiently  puritanical  to  dislike 


196  MONK  AND  KNIGHT. 

the  idea  of  his  daughter's  efforts  at  creating  beautiful 
things.  The  Renaissance  had  not  given  him  any  more 
precious  substitute  for  a  fragment  of  a  certain  brevi- 
ary, which  was  once  the  possession  of  Alke's  mother,  — 
an  heirloom  of  contending  memories,  which  had  come 
straight  from  the  family  of  Count  Aldani  Neforzo.  In 
an  hour  of  tearful  memory  he  had  given  it  to  Alke's 
eager  girlhood.  The  leaves  comprised  only  a  soiled  frag- 
ment ;  for  everything  which  in  any  way  perpetuated  a 
holy  fable  or  enshrined  a  breath  of  superstition  had  been 
torn  away,  in  one  of  those  other  moments  when  Caspar 
had  felt  himself  almost  a  militant  protester. 

"  As  young  Angelo  confessed  the  Torso  in  Lorenzo's 
garden  to  be  his  master,  so,  my  child,  you  must  take  these 
to  be  yours,"  said  the  proud  man  to  his  ambitious  child. 
And  then  he  would  talk  on  and  relate  again  the  well- 
known  story  of  Michael  Angelo,  which  he  had  heard  Pico 
della  Mirandola  repeat  to  Aldus  the  printer,  in  Venice. 

There,  in  that  little  cottage  to  which  they  had  removed 
so  recently  from  sadder  scenes,  through  the  afternoons 
when  others  were  tending  the  goats,  sat  this  sad  and 
burdened  girl,  surrounded  with  the  materials  for  her  art. 
As  the  Barb6  looked  over  these,  he  found  himself  par- 
tially reconciled  to  the  idea  of  his  sheep  wandering  in 
what  had  appeared  to  him  to  be  perilous  pastures.  With 
a  saintly  look  upon  his  worn  countenance,  which  he  did 
not  in  the  least  affect,  he  followed  the  maiden,  as  she 
explained  to  him  the  making  of  a  gilt  ground  and  the 
laying  in  of  a  silver  border. 

"Whence  does  my  child  get  the  gilt  and  silver?" 
Caspar  saw  that  question  asking  itself  upon  the  Barbe's 
lips,  and  he  spoke  it. 

Alke  blushed  with  her  fresh  beauty,  as  she  thought  of  a 
certain  youth  whom  she  had  met  as  a  shepherd  boy  in  the 
fields  near  the  foot-hills. 

The  Barbe  feared  that  he  had  exceeded  the  liberty 


A    WALDENSIAN  OF  THE  RENAISSANCE. 

involved  in  the  discharge  of  his  pastoral  duties  in  creat- 
ing an  atmosphere  of  curiosity,  and  he  was  relieved  when 
she  did  not  answer,  but  instead,  pursued  her  way  in  mak- 
ing clear  to  his  wondering  eye  the  secrets  of  such  ex- 
quisite calligraphy. 

"  The  printing-press,"  said  the  Barbe",  "  will  make  you 
the  last  of  the  race  of  scribes  and  illuminators." 

"  It  will  never  destroy  the  beauty  of  ornamentation  by 
hand,  I  well  believe.  The  organ  has  not  taken  any  charm 
from  the  singing  of  a  melodious  voice."  She  answered 
with  a  song  in  every  word  which  she  spoke. 

"  T  is  a  large  world.  Perhaps  there  is  room  enough 
within  it  for  everything  except  a  monk." 

This  last  Alke  knew  was  directed  against  her  furnish- 
ing to  a  monastery  anything  so  desirable  as  illuminations. 
But  genuine  love  of  art,  fear  of  want,  and  the  idea 
of  "spoiling  the  Egyptians,"  by  obtaining  money  and 
by  placing  in  monkish  hands  an  illumination  full  of  the 
reforming  zeal  and  ideal,  kept  Alke  on  her  feet,  while 
this  wave  of  pastoral  opposition  passed  over  her. 

"  The  older  writing  beneath,  on  this  sheet,  is  more  in- 
teresting to  you  than  the  new,"  said  he,  as  she  showed 
him  a  palimpsest,  on  which  the  ancient  Latin  lines  were 
fairly  clear,  lying  beneath  the  newly  inscribed  lines  of  a 
homily  which  perpetuated  the  story  of  Saint  Benedict  un- 
tying by  a  word  the  cords  which  bound  the  Arian  Goth, 
Zalla. 

"  Ah  I  "  said  Gaspar,  who  happened  near  for  a  moment, 
"  you  can  see  it  all  in  that  palimpsest.  Old  and  uncon- 
querable Rome  looks  out  at  us  to-day  from  beneath  the 
incredible  fancies  of  modern  ecclesiastical  Rome.  See 
the  ancient  uncials." 

"  But,"  said  the  Barbe",  who  had  no  patience  with  the 
Renaissance  alone,  "  old  Rome  was  pagan,  and  is  pagan 
yet." 

"  Modern  Rome  —  the  Rome  which  rules  now  —  is 


198  MONK  AND   KNIGHT. 

superstitious.  What  we  need  in  the  world,  first  and  above 
all  else,  is  freedom.  These  visits  to  old  Rome,  by  the 
human  mind,  made  by  way  of  manuscripts  and  monu- 
ments, make  the  soul  feel  how  great  and  free  was  man 
before  the  Church  had  enslaved  him.  They  lead  on  to 
the  wise  suspicion  that  the  human  mind  might  get  on 
again,  with  some  issue  of  success,  without  such  a  thing  as 
a  Pope.  Europe  knows  now  that  a  Christianity  no  better 
than  paganism  is  much  worse ;  that  a  Pope  who  is  only 
a  spiritual  Caesar  cannot  be  so  valuable  to  the  world  as  a 
Caesar." 

"  Alas  ! "  said  the  Barb£,  fearing,  as  have  many  since 
his  day,  the  healthful  rationalism  which  lies  at  the  heart 
of  all  thorough  reformation,  and  yet  not  sure  to  grasp  a 
remedy  for  such  fear,  "  old  Rome  will  not  free  mankind 
from  new  Rome.  A  Caesar  is  worse  than  the  Pope." 

"  Nay,"  was  the  reply,  "  nay  !  Freedom  comes  by 
the  truth.  The  truth  shall  make  men  free.  But  the  dis- 
covery of  so  great  a  past  beneath  such  a  hard  and  intol- 
erant present  as  is  ours,  is  the  truth  with  which  to  begin. 
It  makes  us  free  from  the  notion  that  God  is  confined  to 
the  days  of  the  papacy.  The  reason  of  man  is  liberated, 
and  there  will  be  great  changes." 

The  fresh  evening  air  fanned  the  cheeks  of  Alke ;  and 
her  bright  eyes  were  abysmal  with  a  mysterious  glory,  as 
she  tried  to  disengage  the  Barbe  from  his  thoughts  as  he 
stood  there,  his  eyes  resting  upon  two  uncial  letters, 
which  she  had  made  in  imitation  of  those  of  the  sixth 
century,  when  the  patient  calligrapher  had  not  yet  surren- 
dered to  the  speedier  tachygrapher  with  his  easy  minus- 
cule. His  mind,  however,  did  not  cease  pursuing  through 
endless  ramifications  the  vitalizing  idea,  with  the  expres- 
sion of  which  Caspar  had  left  him,  until  Alke  had  placed 
befoie  him  a  richly  embellished  copy  of  the  Lord's 
Prayer. 

His  eyes  were   two  fountains  of  joy.     "  I  would  that 


A    WALDENSIAN  OF  THE  RENAISSANCE.      199 

you  could  sell  that  to  any  monastery,"  he  said  at  once. 
"  The  ignorant  mumbling  of  syllables  which  they  do  not 
understand  might  cease,  if  every  monk  were  bound  to 
read  from  this  parchment  as  he  prayed." 

Alke  had  reserved  this  precious  leaf  for  her  pastor ; 
and  now  that  he  had  confessed  such  extraordinary  de- 
light over  it,  she  herself  was  overjoyed.  Only  one  thing 
she  desired  to  do.  The  Barb£  had  asked  to  see  her  at 
her  work.  Study  of  Virgil,  and  of.  that  nature  which 
Virgil  had  interpreted  to  her,  under  the  all-pervading 
idea  of  the  Fatherhood  of  God  which  had  possessed  her 
life,  had  led  her  to  feel  —  what  now  she  even  attempted 
to  realize  —  a  desire  to  make  others  conscious  of  the 
significance  of  the  growing  corn,  as  a  part  of  that  revela- 
tion of  the  Divine  Fatherhood,  which,  with  her  Greek 
temper,  she  beheld  in  a  half-pantheistic  way  in  the  field 
near  by. 

The  Barbe"  was  soon  sitting  by  her  side  ;  and  as  in  deep 
thought  he  stroked  the  long  beard  which  Alke  knew  he 
had  suffered  to  grow  because  the  priests  shaved  instead, 
the  light  came  in  over  the  shoulders  upon  which  lay  the 
sunny  hair,  and  falling  on  the  parchment,  played  with 
the  purple  background  upon  which  were  particles  of  bur- 
nished gold.  The  hand  which  had  so  often  by  day 
gathered  sticks  at  the  foot-hills,  and  the  fingers  which  at 
eventide  had  pushed  their  loving  way  through  the  thick 
locks  of  Gaspar  Perrin,  seemed  instinct  with  power  and 
grace,  as  she  retouched  the  parchment.  Alke  had  lifted 
many  heavy  burdens,  —  the  prominence  of  the  wrist-bone 
showed  the  Barbe  how  overtasked  her  youth  had  been,  — 
but  her  arm  now  appeared  to  possess  all  possible  love- 
liness, as  she  placed  her  hand  upon  the  unornamented 
portion  of  the  parchment,  or  found  the  right  color  near 
it.  Saucepans  and  bowls  made  a  background  of  sug- 
gestive realism  for  the  no  less  real  cuttle-fish  powder 
with  which  she  had  rubbed  the  manuscript,  her  silver- 


20O  MONK  AND  KNIGHT. 

pointed  brass  pencil  which  had  been  brought  from  Venice, 
plaster  made  ready  for  the  ground  of  gold,  the  slab  of 
porphyry  on  which  she  had  ground  her  Greek  green, 
dragon's  blood,  and  saffron,  which  being  covered  now 
with  water,  and  near  at  hand,  were  ready  to  be  trans- 
formed into  a  likeness  unto  the  sheaf  of  corn,  which  also 
with  a  red  blossom  stood  before  her. 

As  the  Waldensian  maiden,  in  the  presence  of  her 
shepherd  and  friend,  drew  the  lines  and  added  the  col- 
ors which  in  the  form  of  flowers  or  heads  of  corn  em- 
bellished the  words  "  OUR  FATHER,"  the  Barb£  concluded 
that  in  spite  of  all  that  he  had  feared  of  the  danger  to  which 
such  a  rare  soul  was  exposed,  in  creating  beautiful  pages 
for  the  eyes  of  the  monks,  he  ought  to  say  something  in 
praise  of  what  he  saw  while  she  abstractedly  painted 
and  sang,  tone  and  color  vying  each  with  the  other  in 
harmony. 


CHAPTER    XVHI. 


MAIDEN   AND   NOVICE. 

Yet  better  were  this  mountain  wilderness, 
And  this  wild  life  of  danger  and  distress,  — 
Watchings  by  night  and  perilous  flight  by  day, 
And  meetings  in  the  depths  of  earth  to  pray,  — 
Better,  far  better,  than  to  kneel  with  them, 
And  pay  the  impious  rite  thy  laws  condemn. 

BRYANT. 


is  at  least  beautiful,"  said  the  Barbe"  reluc- 
tantly,  as  he  took  up  a  piece  of  parchment  on 
which  the  girlish  hand  had  copied  the  sentence,  "The 
trees  of  the  field  shall  clap  their  hands."  Around  and 
within  these  words  she  had  so  arranged  the  coniferous 
trees  that  they  appeared  to  wave  with  joy  under  the 
influence  of  the  mountain  winds  ;  while  below  them  were 
broad  beeches,  half  lucent  with  a  gentle  dawn,  and 
heavily  laden  chestnuts  in  whose  branches  played  broken 
lights  and  shadows. 

"  None  of  the  saints  are  to  be  found  in  my  collection  ; 
but  I  do  paint  the  holy  apostles." 

"Alas,  I  must  say,  even  to  you,  Alke,  have  a  care  !  " 
The  Barb£  repeated  the  injunction.  "  Have  a  care,  my 
child,  —  whom  I  can  no  longer  call  my  lamb,  as  I  used 
to  do,  —  have  a  care,  lest  in  painting  even  them  you 
continue  the  superstitions  about  them  by  your  art." 

"  Here  is  the  holy  apostle  John,"  said  Alke,  hesitantly, 


202  MONK  AND  KNIGHT. 

as  she  brought  forth  a  richly  toned  page  from  an  old 
carven  case  which  was  a  relic  of  other  days. 

"  Of  course  you  cannot  sell  such  pictures  as  this  to  the 
monks.  I  like  this  picture  of  Saint  John.  He  is  dressed 
like  a  Barbe,"  remarked  the  Waldensian  minister,  with  a 
sort  of  pious  and  bigoted  glee  ;  "  he  is  one  of  us.  We 
belong,  as  you  know,  Alke,  to  an  early  age." 

"  I  have  been  taught  that  ours  is  the  Church  of  the 
Apostles.  I  know  that  the  Holy  Church  is  not  holy," 
said  Alke,  with  a  religious  naivete  quite  unappreciated 
by  the  Barbe",  who  was  looking  upon  the  picture. 

There  was  something  so  intelligently  serene  and  yet  so 
passionate  in  the  face  of  the  apostle,  that  Caspar,  who 
had  been  most  careful  to  note  the  physical  and  mental 
development  of  this  precocious  child,  found  a  shadow 
inclining  over  his  soul. 

He  was  silent  as  he  thought :  "  No  one  could  have 
made  those  eyes,  and  put  the  quiver  of  life  within  those 
lips,  without  a  feeling,  profound  and  comprehensive,  of 
what  is  in  man's  life  and  woman's  life.  Alke  —  my  baby- 
girl  no  longer! — Alke  is  growing  toward  womanhood. 
The  problem  of  life,  —  its  fire,  its  frost,  its  terrestrial  and 
celestial  energies,  —  all  the  problem  of  saint  and  sinner 
has  just  recently  opened  its  significance  unto  her.  My 
little  child  has  already  put  the  history  of  the  eating  of 
the  tree  of  knowledge  in  the  face  of  the  most  blessed 
apostle." 

Caspar  had  not  seen  Alke's  picture  of  Mary  Mag- 
dalene, and  it  was  perhaps  well.  He  felt  the  warm  tears 
hanging  upon  his  eyelids;  but  through  them,  with  the 
Barbe,  he  was  soon  looking  at  another  picture. 

The  Barb£  was  startled.  Caspar  was  as  serious  in  his 
thought  as  he  was  calm  in  his  bearing.  The  young  artist 
had  transfixed  their  questions  and  emotions  with  her 
illumination.  It  was  at  once  a  commentary  and  a  reve- 
lation. There  on  the  piece  of  parchment,  which  bore 


MAIDEN  AND  NOVICE.  203 

on  the  other  side  the  fading  memory  of  a  drawing  which 
had  long  ago  been  made  to  perpetuate  an  improbable 
Romish  legend,  the  Waldensian  girl  had  painted  sober 
but  inspiring  history.  It  was  a  martyrdom,  the  burning 
of  a  heretic. 

The  fire  seemed  to  consume  the  very  parchment. 
Every  color  was  livid  with  the  heat.  It  trembled  and 
leaped,  and  twisted  its  wrathful  flames  upon  a  rock, 
which  was  portrayed  with  such  powerful  realism  as  to 
evoke  from  the  Barbe  the  exclamation :  "  The  rock  of 
Mentoules  !  the  rock  of  Mentoules  !  " 

Then  the  illumination  silenced  him.  Arrows  and 
javelins  appeared  instinct  with  murderous  intent,  as  they 
lay  within  reach  of  the  lambent  flames.  The  face  of  the 
persecuting  prior,  who  stood  by,  was  a  portrait  of  satanic 
hate  ;  and  the  suggestion  of  armed  bands  of  cruel  men 
crowded  the  pictured  scene  with  resounding  footsteps. 
Out  of  the  rising,  living  pyramid  of  fire  looked  a  scorched 
face. 

"  It  is  Louis,  Louis,  my  own  brother  !  "  ejaculated  the 
Barbe" .  "  Curses  upon  them  that  burned  him  !  Nay, 
nay  !  " —  the  Barbe  was  looking  into  the  soft,  clear  eyes 
of  Alke,  —  "  nay,  nay  !  God  counted  my  brother  -Louis 
worthy  of  martyrdom,  and  you  have  painted  the 
hour  —  " 

"  The  hour  of  coronation,"  said  Caspar,  who  saw  that 
the  Barb£  was  busy  wiping  the  fast- flowing  tears  from  his 
cheeks. 

From  that  hour  the  minister  was  entirely  reconciled 
to  Alke's  art ;  though  once  afterward,  having  been  led 
by  her  to  read  Dante's  "  Purgatorio,"  he  ventured  to 
call  her  attention  to  the  fact  that  of  the  two  illumi- 
nators whom  he  celebrates,  one  of  them  is  in  the  state  of 
purgatory.  He  never  again,  however,  sought  to  inquire 
how  far  she  had  wandered  from  his  own  religious  opinions 
in  making  this  art  supply  the  necessities  of  her  father's 


2O4  MONK  AND  KNIGHT. 

home.  If  he  had  inquired  further,  he  might  have  dis- 
covered that  at  that  hour  she  was  desirous  to  be  at  work 
finishing  the  manuscript,  and  that  she  had  been  per- 
suaded and  enabled  to  attempt  it  through  the  machi- 
nations of  a  priest  who,  though  thirty  miles  away,  had 
heard  of  her  work. 

This  was  the  story :  A  brother  in  the  monastery  of 
Turin  had,  a  year  before,  been  fortunate  enough  to  be 
passing  through  the  town  of  La  Torre,  upon  an  errand 
that  permitted  the  novice  who  was  his  companion  to 
find  a  scrap  of  parchment  which,  on  presentation  at  the 
sacred  house  of  the  Capuchins,  proved  to  have  been 
freshly  colored  with  a  dye  resembling  Tyrian  purple. 
Every  man  in  the  scriptorium  partook  of  the  excitement 
which  it  roused.  Could  it  be  possible  that  the  secret  of 
making  a  dye  which  in  the  days  of  Charlemagne  made 
the  parchments  so  proper  a  background  for  golden  let- 
ters, had  been  recovered?  Who  possessed  the  precious 
secret  ?  Besides,  here,  upon  this  trifling  scrap,  were 
certain  letters,  placed  there  with  almost  perfect  art ! 
They  composed  the  Lord's  Prayer. 

"Surely,"  said  the  priests,  "it  is  a  Waldensian's 
work." 

"I  saw  a  maiden  of  great  beauty  drop  it  in  the  street," 
was  the  information  which  the  novice  of  Turin  finally 
yielded  to  the  authorities. 

"The  secret  shall  be  ours,"  were  the  swiftly  uttered 
words  in  reply. 

Before  a  month  had  gone,  this  very  novice,  properly 
instructed,  had  been  placed  under  the  priest  of  La 
Torre,  and  in  the  clothes  of  a  peasant's  son  had  obeyed 
the  priest  in  going  forth  morning  after  morning  to  the 
mountain-side,  until  he  had  found  Alke  tending  the  goats. 
With  consummate  care,  and  as  the  result  of  desirable 
rewards,  such  as  appealed  to  this  maiden's  power  which 
was  thirsty  for  opportunities,  he  had  found  out  that  her 


MAIDEN  AND  NOVICE. 

father  Caspar  Perrin  had  once  been  a  printer  in  Venice, 
and  knew  the  secret  of  empurpling  parchment,  and  that 
she  often  illuminated  the  colored  material.  His  talk 
opened  a  new  world  of  hope  before  Alke. 

Very  soon  through  this  youth,  who  so  excellently  exe- 
cuted the  schemes  of  these  authorities,  the  priest  of  La 
Torre  had  made  purchases  sufficient  to  justify  the  opinion 
of  his  friends  and  that  of  the  neighboring  monastery  of 
Turin  that  the  safety  of  Caspar  Perrin  was  desirable.  It 
was  agreed  that  in  no  event  should  his  life  be  imperilled 
until  this  secret  should  be  found  out ;  and  more  espe- 
cially was  it  understood  that  the  girl,  who  had  been  an 
artist  even  in  childhood,  should  be  drawn  by  every 
politic  measure  into  the  service  of  empurpling  and 
illuminating  parchments  for  the  monastery. 

"  She  shall  be  ours,  —  she  and  her  secret  shall  be 
ours  !  "  swore  the  priest  in  charge  of  the  scriptorium. 

"Oh,  if  only  I  could  buy  parchment !  "  said  Alke,  one 
day,  in  the  hearing  of  this  disguised  novice,  who  had 
paused  with  a  bundle  of  fagots  at  his  side  to  speak  with 
her.  He  had  been  taught  to  await  the  mention  of  that 
necessity. 

"  Would  you  like  to  make  some  coins  by  painting  on 
some  new  parchment  ?"  was  the  studied  inquiry. 

Alke's  innocent  eyes  brightened.  It  had  been  a 
winter  of  sorrowful  hunger,  and  Alke  knew  that  the 
larder  was  empty.  The  father  stood  before  this  heroic 
maiden  in  all  his  gaunt  and  gracious  weakness,  as  she 
attempted  to  speak. 

"I  could  —  " 

It  was  impossible  for  her  to  keep  the  tears  out  of 
sight ;  and  they  meant  so  much  more  than  words  could 
mean  to  him,  that  the  young  Capuchin  felt  a  strange 
twinge  of  joyous  pain  in  his  heart. 

"  I  know  where  we  may  find  a  small  missal,  which 
you  could  make  much  more  beautiful.  It  is  not  far 


2O6  MONK  AND  KNIGHT. 

away;  if  you  will  illuminate  it,  you  shall  have  many 
coins." 

This  missal  had  been  in  Alke's  hands  from  that  day ; 
and  now  the  last  lovely  picture  had  been  completed.  It 
lay  in  the  oaken  chest,  and  it  was  the  only  work  of  Alke 
which  the  devout  Barb£  did  not  see. 

It  seemed  sufficient  to  both  Alke  and  her  father  that 
the  kindly  pastor  had  been  so  easily  reconciled  to  her 
art  by  the  sight  of  the  painting  which  he  had  just 
looked  upon.  Alke  and  Caspar  were  able  to  keep  a 
secret  which  was  assuredly  innocent  enough,  and  which 
yielded  such  comfort  in  mitigating  the  sorrows  of  their 
poverty. 

"That  missal,"  said  the  happy  child  to  her  father, 
when  he  seemed  sad  because  she  worked  so  diligently 
and  became  so  weary,  —  "that  missal  will  help  us  to  keep 
all  the  books  which  you  brought  from  Venice."  Then 
Caspar  would  look  proudly  upon  her  and  upon  the 
books,  to  the  list  of  which  Aldus  and  his  son  had  con- 
tributed additions  from  time  to  time,  all  of  which  he  had 
been  compelled  to  think  of  selling. 

For  the  Barb£  an  hour  of  sorrowful  recollection  had 
come  and  gone.  It  had,  however,  quickened  his  sense 
of  ministerial  responsibility.  His  mind  was  full  of  plans 
for  the  day  or  night  of  communion.  He  had  been 
compelled  to  fix  upon  the  midnight  hour. 

"  Our  meeting  shall  occur  at  midnight,"  said  he  to 
the  chief  members  of  the  fraternity,  as  they  loved  to  call 
their  simple  organization,  who  had  just  come  to  consult 
with  the  Barbe".  There  was  a  firm  tone  of  commanding 
courage  in  the  voice,  as  he  looked  into  the  face  of  the 
youthful  assistant  with  whom  he  always  made  his  visita- 
tions. The  members  of  the  fraternity  retired. 

"  Perhaps  our  joy  on  this  birthday  will  end  in  mourn- 
ing," ventured  the  young  man. 

" '  It  is  better  to  go  to  the  house  of  mourning  than  to 


MAIDEN  AND   NOVICE. 


207 


the  house  of  feasting,'  "  replied  the  elder,  as  they  started 
together  toward  the  simple  repast  which  in  Caspar's 
home  made  the  evening  meal. 

Holiday  that  it  was,  and  happy  as  the  friendly  neigh- 
bors had  seemed  throughout  the  day,  that  evening  meal 
was  itself  a  tender,  loving  communion  service.  It  was 
the  Waldensian  eucharistic  reminiscence  of  apostolic 
times. 

"Benedicte,  Kyrie  eleison,  Christe  eleison,  Kyrie 
eleison,  Pater  noster,"  broke  forth  the  rich  voice  of  the 
Barbe,  as  they  were  seated  at  the  table. 

Alke's  golden  head  was  bowed ;  but  the  devil-like 
eyes  of  a  monk  who  gazed  in  upon  them  from  his 
place  of  hiding  without,  saw  that  no  one  made  the  sign 
of  the  cross,  and  that  the  room  was  bare  of  images. 

"  God,  even  our  God,  who  provided  food  for  His 
prophets  and  feedeth  His  children  with  manna,  bless  our 
meal  and  this  reunion!"  said  the  devout  Caspar ;  and 
he  added,  "  In  nominis  Patris  et  Filii  et  Spiritus  Sancti. 
Amen." 

The  cruel  eyes  of  the  stout  monk  who  had  concealed 
himself  in  the  bushes  near  the  open  window,  might  then 
have  beheld  them  making  the  sign  of  the  cross,  but  for 
the  fact  that  in  his  hiding-place  he  was  trying  to  com- 
plete his  plan  for  the  killing  of  the  Barbe,  for  whose 
noble  heart  he  had  a  poisoned  dagger. 

There  was  but  one  topic  at  the  table  of  this  militant 
Waldensian,  and  Caspar  was  loquacious. 

"  It  is  the  same  with  us  as  it  was  with  our  ancestors,  — 
the  same  foe,  the  same  fight.  We  —  God  be  thanked  ! 
—  are  surer  of  our  ground.  The  Pope  still  pretends 
himself  to  be  more  than  man,  and  only  less  than  God 
Himself.  Men  believe  it  only  where  they  cannot  read 
God's  Word ;  for  the  Scriptures  say  not  that  the  Pope 
should  rule  over  men  and  kingdoms.  Only  one  is  master, 
and  that  is  Jesus  Christ.  So  long  as  the  priest  anoints 


208  MONK  AND   KNIGHT. 

the  king,  the  Church  will  be  tyrannical  and  full  of  abomi- 
nation. The  Church  neglects  her  righteous  duties  in  not 
blessing  the  souls  of  men,  and  becomes  corrupt  in  the 
attempt  to  control  nations.  Ours  it  is  to  oppose  by  life 
and  doctrine,  not  the  right,  but  the  wrong  which  the 
priests  smile  upon  and  bless." 

"  There  is  nothing  right  in  the  Church.  The  Church 
is  beyond  remedy.  Priestcraft  is  wholly  evil.  The  mon- 
asteries are  the  hiding-places  of  iniquity,"  urged  the 
more  radical  and  dogmatic  Barbe",  who  detected  in  Gas- 
par  a  feeling  of  tolerance  toward  the  monks  of  Turin 
which  he  could  not  allow  to  go  uncorrected. 

"  There  are  yet  some  benefits  which  may  come  to  us," 
said  Caspar,  "  even  from  the  monasteries.  They  have 
kept  the  manuscripts  of  other  days,  and  have  often  been 
the  only  hope  of  learning." 

"They  are  not  now,"  said  the  Barbe",  with  earnestness. 
"  Learning  such  as  yours  has  come  into  the  world  in 
spite  of  monkish  opposition,  not  by  the  help  of  abbeys 
and  bishops.  Besides,  religion  is  greater  than  learning. 
I  would  rejoice  to  see  yonder  monastery  in  flames." 

The  concealed  monk  without  gnashed  his  teeth  in  his 
rage.  Caspar  within  hesitated  to  speak,  because  he  was 
not  quite  sure  but  that  the  Virgil  manuscript  which  Eras- 
mus sought  at  Turin  had  come  to  La  Torre.  He  could  not 
think  of  the  walls  of  a  scriptorium  in  flames.  The  thought 
of  the  manuscript  kept  him  silent. 

The  monk  outside  had  made  a  favorable  construction 
of  Caspar's  silence,  and  had  found  himself  restless  at 
eavesdropping  when  he  considered  the  heresies  of  the 
Barbe".  "Surely,"  thought  he,  "the  father  of  the  girl 
is  not  heretical."  And  into  the  shade  he  ran  until  he 
had  found  the  leader  of  his  fellow-conspirators,  whom  he 
persuaded  to  spare  Caspar's  cottage,  which  they  had 
planned  to  burn  over  the  Barbels  head. 

Scarcely,  however,  had  the  monk  left  the  bushes  near 


MAIDEN  AND  NOVICE.  2OQ 

the  window,  when  Caspar  explained  the  true  reason  for 
his  interest  in  the  monastic  institutions  in  that  vicinity. 
He  told  the  Barbe  of  the  visit  of  Erasmus ;  and  forthwith, 
as  he  remembered  Erasmus  sympathizing  with  him  when 
he  had  spoken  of  the  loss  of  his  boy,  he  surpassed  all 
that  the  good  pastor  had  said  in  his  expressions  of  violent 
heresy. 

"  They  count  us  more  dangerous  than  Saracens ;  and 
the  cruelty  which  they  show  in  the,  murdering  of  loyal 
men  is  more  malignant  than  that  with  which  they  kill 
Turks.  Never  were  there  such  base,  bloodthirsty  knaves 
as  the  Dominicans ;  nothing  is  so  holy  to  a  Capuchin  as 
a  massacre.  And  yet  —  and  yet  I  shall  have  that  manu- 
script of  Virgil." 

This  he  said,  feeling  that  his  orthodox  hatred  of  priestly 
crime  was  always  likely  to  seem  to  be  waning  at  the 
remembrance  of  Aldus  and  that  manuscript  in  the 
scriptorium. 

"  My  brother  may  lose  his  soul  in  trifling  for  a  fragment 
of  ancient  and  corrupt  Rome,"  said  the  Barb£,  solemnly. 

"  I  shall  never  lose  it  to  the  modern  and  more  corrupt 
Rome,"  was  the  answer. 

"  No,  Caspar ;  you  have  been  true.  Your  household 
knows  all  the  story.  You  are  honestly  trying  to  be  a 
Waldensian  and  an  Erasmian." 

"  Never  !  "  cried  out  Caspar.  "  Erasmus  is  afraid. 
Am  I  ?  "  and  the  scarred  wrists,  which  bore  their  awful 
testimony,  were  immediately  thrust  before  the  Barbe 's 
eyes.  "  I  fear  nothing,  but  being  untrue  to  God  and  the 
holy  Scriptures." 

"  The  holy  Scriptures  say,  «  Seek  first  the  kingdom  of 
God,  and  all  these  things  shall  be  added.'  You  shall 
get  the  manuscript  for  the  cause  of  learning,  when  the 
cause  of  religion  shall  have  conquered  and  prostrated  the 
walls  of  these  monasteries  in  the  dust.  The  kingdom 
of  God  on  earth  will  bring  every  other  righteous  sov- 
VOL.  i  — 14 


210  MONK  AND  KNIGHT. 

ereignty  along  with  it.  It  will  not  come  as  Erasmus 
thinks  —  " 

"  How?  "  interjected  Caspar. 

"  Not  under  the  wing  of  the  kingdom  of  culture,"  re- 
plied the  Barbe" .  "  It  will  come  in  its  own  triumph ;  and 
it  will  turn  and  overturn  all  else,  until,  with  its  establish- 
ment, these  kingdoms  of  freedom  and  culture  shall  be 
safely  builded  in  its  majestic  shadow." 

"  I  told  Erasmus  as  much,"  said  the  charmed  Caspar, 
as  he  saw  the  eloquent  lips  of  the  Barb£  pause. 

"  The  contest  is  upon  us.  May  God  make  us  strong  ! 
The  world  is  not  able  to  use  a  manuscript  of  Virgil 
worthily,  until  it  has  read  without  a  tremor  the  manuscript 
of  Saint  Paul  the  Apostle.  To  accomplish  this  means 
the  overthrow  of  the  kingdom  of  darkness  by  the  king- 
dom of  light.  Jesus  Christ,  not  Virgil,  is  the  Light  of 
the  world.  All  genuine  kingdoms  are  comprehended 
under  the  kingdom  of  Christ  the  Lord." 

As  the  Barb6  with  shining  face  turned  toward  Alke, 
the  red  glow  of  evening  shone  upon  his  gray  dress  ;  and 
the  maiden's  eyes  were  restless  enough  in  that  expectant 
air,  as  she  thought  of  the  days  immediately  to  come,  and 
reflected  that  if  one  of  them  proved  true  to  her  hope,  be- 
fore the  Barbe"  should  leave  their  affrighted  community, 
she  herself,  according  to  the  word  of  the  young  peasant 
shepherd,  would  have  in  her  own  hands  the  manuscript 
of  Virgil. 

"  It  is  an  outrageous  law  which  would  prevent  us  from 
meeting  together  and  discussing  the  Catholic  faith,"  said 
Caspar.  "  How  gladly  do  the  spies  of  Rome  run  to  the 
confessors  and  inform  their  prelates  of  our  conferences  ! 
Doubtless  at  this  hour  you  are  watched." 

"  I  escaped  a  band  of  monks  near  the  opening  of  the 
valley.  Brutal  faces  had  they,  yet  not  so  brutal  as  the 
faces  of  some  who  made  the  doctrines  which  we  cannot 
obey  !  "  answered  the  Barbe". 


MAIDEN  AND  NO  VICE.  2 1 1 

"  Brutes  rule  us!"  said  Caspar;  "and  however  wor- 
thy the  children  of  heretics  may  be,  they  may  not  hold 
office  until  the  second  generation  be  passed.  Our  homes 
are  kept  pure,  and  prayers  arise  continually  from  house- 
holds which  may  be  demolished  at  any  time  for  shelter- 
ing a  heretic.  Even  if  I  know  a  heretic,  —  a  man  who 
insists  upon  the  right  to  his  own  soul,  —  and  if  I  do  not 
report  my  criminal  knowledge  to  the  authorities,  it  is 
likely  to  mean  banishment  for  me.  And  yet  I  trust 
God  —  " 

"And  so  does  Alke?" 

The  fair  face  smiled ;  and  eyes  which  looked  fearlessly 
toward  heaven  made  sufficient  answer  to  the  Barbe. 

As  they  arose  from  the  table,  about  which  such  light- 
ning-like forces  had  been  playing,  the  first  word  which 
escaped  the  lips  of  the  Barbe"  was,  "  Peace  !  "  and  in 
tones  of  musical  praise  there  followed  the  words  of  the 
Revelation  :  "  Glory,  wisdom,  thanksgiving,  honor,  power, 
and  might  be  to  our  God  forever  and  ever." 

No  monkish  embellishment  could  have  added  beauty 
or  dignity  to  the  appearance  of  this  simple  man  of  God 
when  he  prayed  :  "  May  God  reward  with  plenitude  and 
bless  with  abundance  those  who  have  been  our  blessing 
and  joy ;  and  having  fed  our  bodies,  may  God  feed  our 
souls.  May  God  be  our  companion,  and  may  we  be  with 
Him  through  eternity." 

Caspar  and  Alke  said,  "  Amen." 

There  they  stood  for  a  moment  in  silence,  the  Barbe" 
holding  aloft  the  hands  of  Alke  and  her  father,  which 
were  joined  to  his,  while  he  whispered  another  prayer. 


CHAPTER  XIX. 

HOLY    COMMUNION. 

Hear,  Father,  hear  Thy  faint,  afflicted  flock 
Cry  to  thee  from  the  desert  and  the  rock  ; 
While  those  who  seek  to  slay  thy  children,  hold 
Blasphemous  worship  under  roofs  of  gold ; 
And  the  broad,  goodly  lands  with  pleasant  airs 
That  nurse  the  grape  and  wave  the  grain,  are  theirs. 

BRYANT. 

FOR  two  hours  before  midnight  the  disguised  monk, 
who  had  left  his  priestly  habit  in  the  convent 
of  La  Torre,  was  listening  to  the  sounds  of  muffled 
voices  which  proceeded  from  a  point  far  up  the  side  of 
one  of  the  mountains  which  guard  the  approaches  of  the 
valley  of  Angrogna.  Since  noontide  he  had  been  toiling 
upward,  seeking  the  opening  to  the  cavern  in  which  the 
papal  party  rightly  surmised  that  the  Waldensians  held 
their  meetings,  wondering  meanwhile  at  the  fierce  cour- 
age of  a  rebellious  fanaticism  which  could  lead  men, 
women,  and  children  to  a  spot,  as  yet  undiscovered  by 
him,  in  which  they  could  bid  defiance  to  bishops  and 
armies.  He  was  now  assured  that  the  sounds  which  had 
floated  to  him  within  the  last  two  hours  came  from  a 
height  immediately  above  him ;  and  he  had  abundant 
reason  for  the  suspicion  that  the  mountaineers  were 
gathering  loose  stones,  placing  them  near  the  mouth  of 


HOLY  COMMUNION.  21$ 

the  cavern,  from  which,  at  any  moment  desired,  they 
might  hurl  them  upon  their  foes  below. 

Religious  persecution  has,  in  all  ages,  made  most  curi- 
ous alliances.  Certain  well-known  architectural  remains 
have  been  aptly  described  as  "  half  church  of  God,  half 
fortress  'gainst  the  Scot."  To  this  class  of  memorials 
would  have  belonged  that  altar- like  creation  which,  under 
the  hands  of  two  of  the  most  stalwart  of  the  Waldensians, 
—  Claude  Rodan  and  Hyppolite  Meane,  —  was  rising  at 
one  end  of  the  huge  cave. 

Troubled  as  was  the  exploring  monk  below  them  to 
find  a  path  to  that  opening  which  the  mountaineers  had 
been  entering  and  re-entering  for  two  hours  and  more, 
these  men  had  marked  its  way  from  the  adjoining  moun- 
tain, so  that,  approaching  it  from  above,  any  one  of  the 
Waldensians,  who  understood  the  language  of  the  rocks 
placed  in  position  on  the  route,  should  not  lose  it  by  a 
footstep. 

The  mountaineers  now  waited  at  the  opening  of  the 
cave  for  their  companions.  The  last  stone  had  been  car- 
ried within ;  and  there,  inside  a  smaller  but  high-arched 
enclosure  within  the  expansive  cavern,  it  stood,  —  a  com- 
munion-table, which  in  an  instant  could  be  transformed 
into  an  armory  of  weapons  such  as  no  ordinary  band  of 
Dominicans  or  Capuchins  could  withstand,  as  these  mis- 
siles should  be  thrown  to  the  roadway  below.  This  latter 
fact  the  concealed  monk  of  Turin  had  known  never  so 
well  as  a  few  minutes  before,  when  a  single  rock,  not 
larger  than  his  own  head,  had  slipped  from  the  grasp  of 
one  of  these  mountaineers  above  him,  and  sped  like  a 
fateful  thunderbolt,  carrying  dust  and  broken  fragments 
of  dead  branches  with  it  into  the  gorge  beneath. 

"  Heresy  has  a  most  frightful  energy,"  said  his  mutter- 
ing lips ;  and  he  wished  himself  back  in  the  Capuchin 
monastery. 

By  eleven  o'clock  that  night,  the  path  along  which  the 


214  MONK  AND  KNIGHT. 

bouquetin  walked  with  steady  but  careful  step,  had  be- 
come a  highway  for  men  and  women,  young  and  old, 
who  from  Angrogna,  Brackcrastro,  Lucerna,  and  even 
Bobbio  beyond  the  Felice,  trod  on,  with  hearts  beating 
with  emotions  of  worship  and  valor,  toward  that  com- 
munion. The  guiding  wisdom  of  properly  placed  rocks 
on  the  way  had  saved  them  from  the  abysses. 

"  Never  did  a  conquering  host  come  back  from  a  field, 
carrying  the  weapons  of  their  enemies,  with  more  heroic 
joy  than  is  yours  even  now,"  said  Caspar  Perrin  to  an 
old  man,  who  sat  by  the  pathway  upon  which  he  had 
fallen  from  exhaustion.  Alke,  whose  tenderness  had  al- 
ready begun  its  ministry  in  wiping  the  blood  from  his 
forehead,  which  had  been  lacerated  as  he  staggered 
against  the  sharp  stones,  sat  with  the  aged  man  for  a 
moment,  and  listened  as  he  described  the  difficulty  with 
which  he  had  made  this  much  of  his  pilgrimage  to  the 
new  shrine.  Her  luxuriant  hair  was  like  a  rich  morning, 
falling  often  upon  *  the  white  head  of  the  old  man  as  she 
listened  to  his  whispers.  He  seemed  to  feel,  as  he  smiled 
his  gratitude,  that  the  sun  had  indeed  gone  down  with 
him,  and  only  the  silver  moonlight  of  life,  bright  however 
as  that  moonlight  which  now  illuminated  the  scene,  was 
left. 

"  Oh,  you  are  Caspar  Perrin's  daughter  !  You  are  the 
angel  of  the  dawn,"  he  said,  when,  in  unwonted  brilliance, 
the  moon  irradiated  the  edges  of  the  cloud  and  burst 
forth  again  to  glorify  them  both.  And  then  he  arose,  and 
as  if  supported  by  an  enthusiasm  of  which  her  young  eyes 
were  fountains,  he  trudged  noiselessly  on.  He  was  an 
aged  Barbe",  who  had  come,  as  he  believed,  to  take  his 
last  communion. 

One  by  one,  they  entered  the  place  of  worship.  An 
opening  in  the  rocks  far  up  on  the  side  of  the  smaller 
chamber  allowed  entrance  between  its  mighty  edges 
for  a  rift  of  light.  Omnipotence  had  pierced  the  hard 


HOLY  COMMUNION.  21$ 

brown  texture  of  the  mountain  ;  and  through  the  slight 
aperture  glowed  the  weird  and  solemn  light.  At  first  the 
radiance  faltered  upon  the  rocky  edges  of  the  altar-table. 
Then  the  moon's  softest  beams  lit  up,  with  a  rapturous 
and  majestic  glory,  the  symbols  of  the  broken  body 
and  outpoured  blood  of  the  Redeemer.  Every  ray 
seemed  to  quiver  with  instinctive  and  divine  sympathy, 
as  it  touched  the  bread  and  wine.  Every  crumb  of  the 
bread  was  a  radiance.  The  ruby  droops  of  wine  gleamed 
with  a  living  splendor.  Even  Caspar,  who  had  genera- 
tions of  truest  rationalists  in  his  blood,  found  himself 
looking  upon  the  scene  with  an  awed  soul.  Before  him 
stood  many  of  the  neighboring  mountaineers,  each  un- 
consciously making  the  sign  of  the  cross. 

"  I  have  beheld  the  Host  elevated  within  the  walls  of 
St.  Mark's,"  whispered  Caspar,  "  and  I  have  felt  the  sub- 
lime calm  of  worshipful  emotions,  as  I  gazed  upon  the 
high  altar;  but  never  have  I  beheld  such — " 

"  Never  before,"  said  the  resolute  and  affectionate 
Alke,  "  have  you  beheld  God  himself  touching  the  sac- 
ramental emblems  with  His  own  pencil." 

Caspar's  strong  hand  found  the  warmer  hand  of  the 
maiden,  to  whom  every  revelation  of  the  good  had  be- 
come also  a  revelation  of  the  beautiful  and  the  true ;  and 
he  was  sorry  on  the  instant,  when  he  found  that  he  had 
said  rather  peremptorily,  "  Hush,  my  child  !  " 

But  he  could  not  break  her  spell.  From  that  moment 
Alke  was  an  object  of  peculiar  reverence  and  affection  to 
all  the  Waldensians.  Even  the  regidor  —  the  elder  of 
the  two  Barbes  who  travelled  together  was  called  the 
"regidor;"  the  younger,  "coadjutor"  —  quoted  her 
saying  in  the  sermon  which  followed.  When  the  aged 
man  whom  we  have  seen  with  his  scarred  forehead  smit- 
ten with  the  moonlight,  and  trudging  on  by  Alke's  side 
toward  the  cavern,  heard  her  speak,  he  only  averred 
once  more,  "  She  is  the  angel  of  the  dawn  !  "  Very  soon 


2l6  MONK  AND  KNIGHT. 

the  Waldensian  mothers  who  had  carried  thither  their 
little  ones,  had  crowded  about  her  as  she  stood  outside 
in  the  faint  firelight,  looking  dreamily  toward  heaven. 
Each  mother  was  silent,  that  she  might  hear  what  else 
Alke  should  say  which  would  seem  like  a  revelation.  But 
Alke  only  kissed  the  little  ones. 

"  May  God  preserve  them  in  His  abundant  love  !  " 
said  she,  as  she  carefully  folded  something  from  which 
she  had  been  reading  in  the  moonlight,  —  something 
which  the  simple-hearted  wives  of  the  mountaineers  de- 
clared did  tremble  and  shine  as  did  the  emblems  of  the 
sacrament,  —  and  she  went  into  the  cavern  again.  For 
these  who  lingered  without,  meditating  on  Alke's  words, 
she  prayed. 

Alke  had  become  deeply  conscious  that  she  was  living 
in  a  superstitious  age,  and  that  even  she  must  not  become 
a  stone  of  stumbling  unto  those  who  often  had  felt,  as 
they  turned  aside  from  the  elaborate  ceremonial  and  im- 
pressive worship  taught  by  the  Roman  Church,  a  barren- 
ness of  belief  and  vacancy  of  faith  which  it  was  sometimes 
hard  to  reconcile  with  the  richness  and  sublimity  of  truth. 
Alke  prayed  devoutly  for  them.  She  knew  that  she  pos- 
sessed an  awful  charm  for  their  awakened  religiousness. 
She  and  her  words  in  that  cavern  had  at  once  suggested 
and  outshone  the  picturesqueness  of  the  Church  of  Rome. 
Some  even  whispered  that  she  looked  as  the  Virgin  must 
have  looked  at  the  hour  of  the  annunciation. 

The  regidor  had  begun  to  speak. 

In  a  low  and  impressive  voice  he  said  :  "  We  are  here 
as  the  children  of  a  Father  whose  are  earth  and  heaven. 
But  our  Father's  earth  is  held  by  the  enemies  of  a  true 
faith ;  and  our  foes  are  so  strong  that  we  may  not  wor- 
ship as  God  has  directed  in  the  Scriptures.  We  are 
denied  even  the  open  sky  for  a  pure  faith.  We  have 
been  driven  here  by  the  recollection  of  cruel  swords 
which  have  gleamed  through  many  years.  Our  fathers 


HOLY  COMMUNION.  2 1/ 

before  us  toiled  up  these  steeps,  and  crawled  with  careful 
labor  down  these  fissures,  not  because  they  were  not 
God's  children,  but  because  they  were  truly  such,  and 
sought  to  worship  Him  in  spirit  and  in  truth.  We  have 
this  night  placed  our  feet  in  their  old  path.  It  led  them 
unto  Him  ;  it  will  lead  us  also.  No  rich  windows  filled 
with  monkish  fables  invite  this  light  which  falls  upon  this 
table  of  our  Lord.  It  comes  through  an  air  unvexed  by 
man's  fancies.  God  Himself  touches  these  emblems  with 
a  divine  pencil.  He  has  provided  His  poor  children  with 
tapers  for  the  altar  which  were  lit  beyond  the  stars.  We 
have  no  cathedral  save  this  which  God  builded.  Our 
defence  is  the  munitions  of  rocks.  No  long  trains  of 
priests  and  choristers  animate  this  scene ;  but  the  angels 
of  God,  who  are  silent,  encamp  about  them  who  love 
Him.  Our  song  of  triumph  will  break  forth  when  that 
silence  which  evil  and  pretentious  things  cannot  endure, 
shall  have  swallowed  up  those  who  confound  God's 
people." 

The  coadjutor  arose  and  stood  by  his  side  in  the  pale 
brilliance.  Almost  as  by  inspiration,  a  voice  full  of  re- 
ligious fervor  and  tender  with  the  consciousness  of  mem- 
ories awakened  by  the  emblems  upon  the  stony  altar, 
exhaled  a  breath,  sweet  and  all- pervasive,  —  a  breath  of 
sacred  melody.  Fear  may  have  at  first  compelled  all 
others  to  remain  silent.  The  Barbe  was  mute ;  and 
soon  a  look  of  approval  added  beauty  to  his  sad  and 
worn  face.  The  voice,  which  had  once  grown  hesitant 
on  feeling  its  loneliness,  now  gathered  strength  and  rich- 
ness, as  still  more  solemnly  and  tenderly  it  filled  every 
heart  with  rapture,  and  with  a  deliberate  grandeur  con- 
tinued its  praises  within  the  echoing  vault,  until  the  old 
mountain's  heart  must  have  grown  warm  with  the  melody. 

The  voice  at  length  ceased  its  ministry.  The  tones 
which  fell  at  the  last  from  Alke's  lips  seemed  prayers. 
Every  one  found  within  his  bosom  a  Christ,  to  whom 


2l8  MONK  AND  KNIGHT. 

alone  sins  were  confessed.  Even  the  Barbe's  blue  eyes 
were  tearful;  and  Alke,  when  with  almost  entire  self- 
forgetfulness  she  had  sung  the  entire  canticle  of  Simeon, 
covered  her  face  as  she  prayed. 

So  profound  an  impression  had  the  song  made,  so  did 
its  heart-searching  strains  lift  the  soul  of  each  above  the 
praises  or  curses  of  men  into  the  very  presence  of  God, 
that  the  Barbe,  always  anxious  wisely  to  substitute  for  the 
rejected  confessional  of  man's  invention  something  more 
divine,  stretched  forth  his  hands,  and  only  interpreting 
what  was  occurring  in  many  breasts,  said,  — 

"  Confession  to  us,  confession  even  to  the  most  worthy 
of  men,  can  only  be  blessed  of  God,  when  in  private 
conversation  age  and  good  character  give  their  admoni- 
tion and  comfort  to  the  soul.  I  beg  all  of  you  even 
now  to  confess.  Confess  ye  to  the  Lord  Jesus  Christ, 
the  great  Shepherd  of  the  sheep ;  and  let  no  one  be 
mediator,  in  such  a  moment  as  this,  save  the  great  High 
Priest  who  hath  entered  into  the  Holy  of  Holies  !  " 

At  that  instant,  when  silence  was  teaching  every  one 
how  much  more  stable  was  that  confidence  in  God  which 
their  unuttered  confessions  expressed  than  any  confi- 
dence in  man  could  be,  a  veritable  son  of  Anak,  strong, 
stalwart,  and  untamable  as  all  believed  him  to  be  up  to 
this  moment,  with  tears  flowing  down  his  dust-covered 
cheeks  and  losing  themselves  in  the  thick,  unkempt  locks 
of  his  coarse,  long  beard,  staggered  forward,  and  looking 
like  a  huge  ghost  in  silvery  radiance  which  hung  before 
the  communion  table,  cried  out,  as  he  gazed  into  the  face 
of  the  regidor,  — 

"  I  have  wronged  you  !  'T  is  you,  also,  I  have  wronged. 
God  has  forgiven  me;  will  you  also  forgive?" 

The  face  of  the  regidor  was  a  bright  benediction  when 
he  said,  "  In  the  name  of  Christ,  all  is  forgiven ;  I  have 
nought  against  you." 

"  Ah  !  "  said  Gaspar  Perrin,  who  had  comprehended 


HOLY  COMMUNION*  2IQ 

the  whole  scene,  "  this  is  a  judgment  day  at  midnight. 
God's  throne  is  set  up  in  a  cave.  Surely  "  —  his  eyes 
were  fixed  upon  the  emblems  —  "  the  crucified  Lamb  of 
God  shall  judge  the  earth." 

The  truth  as  to  the  circumstance  was  this.  A  year 
before,  this  same  Catalan  Boursuer  had  been  found  in  a 
quarrel  with  a  fellow  Waldensian,  involving  the  possession 
of  a  harvest.  In  all  such  matters  the  Barbe  usually 
nominated  arbitrators,  thus  hastening  for  truth's  sake  the 
settlement  of  all  disputes.  Most  basely  had  that  mus- 
cular mountaineer  insisted,  when  the  arbitrament  was 
held  against  him,  that  the  Barbe"  had  purposely  appointed 
enemies.  With  a  poisoned  tongue,  which  sort  of  tongue 
is  never  so  venomous  as  after  it  has  learned  pious  phrase- 
ology, had  Catalan  Boursuer  slandered  the  just  and  al- 
together unsuspicious  Barbe\  Now,  and  before  that 
communion-table,  his  Lord  and  Master  had  judged 
Catalan.  Alke's  delicious  song;  Catalan's  rough  figure 
stumbling  through  the  dark  and  falling  before  that  bril- 
liance as  he  uttered  a  half-sobbing  prayer,  —  surely  this 
was  the  gate  of  heaven  to  their  waiting  souls  ! 

In  all  these  circumstances  and  events  there  had  been 
little  to  remind  any  one  who  had  ever  worshipped  at  the 
altars  of  the  Roman  Church,  of  the  ceremonies  of  Ca- 
tholicism. In  the  haste  of  the  next  few  moments,  which 
was  caused  by  an  alarm  from  without,  a  contrast  was  in- 
stituted between  the  celebration  of  the  communion  —  if 
we  must  use  so  protestant  a  phrase  —  as  the  regidor  con- 
ducted it,  and  the  more  ancient  and  churchly  spectacle. 
Such  a  contrast,  indeed,  it  was  as  to  prophesy  the  sim- 
plicity of  coming  days. 

Two  incidents  will  serve  to  show  the  condition  of  the 
Waldensian  mind,  which  at  a  later  date,  on  matters  theo- 
logical and  liturgical,  was  in  some  incidental  regards  as 
easily  satisfied  with  the  opinions  and  practices  of  the 
Reformers  as  they  had  previously  been  with  the  ancient 


220  MONK  AND  KNIGHT. 

forms.  Alke  was  only  one  of  many  in  that  band  in 
whose  blood  ran  a  Romish  culture.  Only  now  and  then 
had  Caspar  detected  in  her  mental  or  spiritual  life  an 
intimation  that  Count  Aldani  Neforzo  was  her  grandsire. 

That  night  as  she  sat  by  his  side,  gazing  upon  the 
moonlit  bread  and  wine,  she  was  thinking  of  the  Trans- 
figuration of  her  Lord  which  she  had  dared  to  attempt 
placing  in  illumination  on  parchment. 

The  hours  were  passing  swiftly.  The  regidor  took  up 
the  service  with  a  solemn  joy.  No  cardinal  in  robes  of 
office  could  have  seemed  more  sublime.  Instead  of 
muttering  the  words  of  the  Mass,  which  they  had  begun 
to  abhor,  there  came  from  every  lip  the  softly  repeated 
Lord's  Prayer,  —  as  simple  as  yonder  baby's  cry,  more 
sublime  than  those  mountain  heights  round  about. 
Every  one  had  bowed  upon  the  cold  floor  of  the  huge 
cavern ;  and  instead  of  "  Ave  Maria,"  came  again,  in  rich 
diapason,  their  simple  canticles,  shaking  again  the  stone 
sides  with  an  echo  of  love  divine. 

Still  did  Alke  view,  with  an  increasing  and  wondering 
interest,  the  glow  of  light  upon  the  unleavened  bread 
and  the  wine  whose  every  drop  trembled  with  that  mel- 
ody. Caspar  saw  her  agitation.  The  girl  for  a  moment 
looked  the  similitude  of  her  dead  mother ;  but  only  as 
the  wife  of  Caspar's  heart  looked  one  night  in  Venice 
when  her  protesting  zeal  left  her  for  a  little  time  and 
she  cried  for  the  Eucharist.  Could  it  be  that  Alke  was 
slipping  from  him? 

He  tried  to  look  a  subduing  calm  into  her  restless 
eyes.  But  no ;  she  was  reflecting  :  "  The  Barbe  has  al- 
lowed me  to  sing;  yes,  he  has  allowed  it." 

A  more  brilliant  streak  of  moonlight  played  upon  the 
bread  and  wine. 

Alke  spoke.  Nay ;  it  was  not  speech  :  it  was  a  chant, 
a  rapture,  a  sort  of  divinely  governed  rhapsody.  Yet 
every  Waldensian  recognized  the  words  as  they  came 


HOLY  COMMUNION.  221 

from  those  inspired  lips,  as  did  the  song  of  Miriam  at  the 
seaside.  They  comprehended  the  story  of  the  Transfig- 
uration of  the  Lord.  Every  ear  was  attentive.  A  hush 
as  of  death  held  the  infant  quiet  in  its  mother's  arms ; 
and  the  silence  communicated  a  sacred  afflatus  to  every 
soul,  as  each  stood  still  with  fixed  eye  beholding  the 
bread  and  wine  which  were  now  glowing  with  the  silvery 
fire,  and  Alke  repeated  the  words  :  "  And  his  face  did 
shine  as  the  sun,  and  his  raiment  was  white  as  the  light." 

Had  Alke  beheld  the  glory  of  transfiguring  power,  in 
the  transformation  of  the  wine  and  bread  into  the  blood 
and  body  of  the  Redeemer? 

For  a  single  moment  did  this  holy  interruption  discon- 
cert the  regidor ;  and  then  he  turned  the  incident,  by 
his  very  silence,  into  the  energy  possessed  by  the  spiritual 
atmosphere  with  which  each  was  surrounded,  if  not  in- 
spired. By  his  side  was  the  youthful  coadjutor,  who  was 
bewildered.  He  appeared  ignorant  of  what  to  expect 
next  in  this  strangely  confused  but  obviously  divinely 
arranged  service. 

At  length  the  regidor  offered  the  broken  bread  to  the 
coadjutor,  then  lifted  a  fragment  to  his  own  lips.  Then 
the  wine  was  taken  by  each,  amid  the  silent  glow.  The 
men  and  women  arose.  Every  soul  became  a  communi- 
cant ;  every  heart  confessed  obedience  to  the  captain  of 
his  salvation.  One  by  one  they  passed  in  front  of  the 
regidor  and  coadjutor,  —  one  of  these  repeating  the 
words  :  "  This  bread  is  broken  for  the  communion  of 
the  body  of  our  Lord  Jesus  Christ  which  we  now  take ;  " 
the  other  saying,  "This  cup  of  blessing  which  is  now 
consecrated  is  the  communion  of  the  blood  of  our  Lord 
Jesus  Christ." 

At  length  Alke  came  alone  unto  the  table  of  her  Lord. 
Every  one  stood  with  hushed  reverence,  as  she  ap- 
proached the  sacred  spot.  There  and  then  had  the  men 
who  looked  upon  her  vowed  to  defend  their  faith.  There 


222  MONK  AND  KNIGHT. 

widows,  who  remembered  on  that  night  the  fathers  of 
their  orphaned  children,  had  given  new  pledges  to  their 
God.  There  old  age  had  sipped  the  nectar  of  eternal 
youth,  as  in  those  bits  of  unleavened  bread  and  in  those 
drops  of  wine  was  revealed  a  living  cause. 

What  had  Alke  to  bring? 

Once  again  did  she  seem  to  Caspar  to  possess  the  tem- 
per and  attitude  of  a  Neforzo.  Within  each  of  us  the 
passion  of  forgotten  ancestry  arises  and  asserts  its  feeble 
existence,  at  these  critical  junctures  in  our  own  lives, 
where  in  the  lives  of  others  and  at  other  times  it  was 
easily  supreme.  Surely  Count  Aldani  Neforzo,  the  father 
of  Alke's  mother,  whose  dust  Caspar  buried  in  Venice,  had 
often  beheld  at  moments  such  as  this,  when  the  oblation 
of  Christ  appeared  to  consecrate  all  acts  and  hopes,  that 
impressive  scene  in  the  life  of  some  copyist  or  illumina- 
tor, when,  seeking  the  salvation  of  his  own  soul  through 
good  works,  the  weary  artist  who  had  lovingly  copied  a 
homily  or  embellished  a  gospel,  would  crowd  close  to  the 
high  altar,  and  strain  to  obtain  a  sight  of  the  elevated 
host,  as  he  begged  the  Holy  Mother  to  receive  the  long- 
ripening  fruit  of  his  genius  and  labor. 

Whatever  force  of  ancestry  was  behind  her,  Alke 
stopped  suddenly  before  the  regidor,  and  looking  only 
at  the  bread  and  wine,  on  which  still  trembled  the  pale 
splendor  which  came  like  a  flood  through  the  aperture 
above  her  head,  bowed  herself;  flung  back  the  sunny 
waves  which  fell  over  her  breast  as  she  uttered  a  brief 
prayer ;  pushed  her  hand  within  her  dress  until  it  felt  her 
own  heart  beat,  and  reaching  the  parchment,  which  we 
saw  her  folding  up  as  she  stood  without  the  cavern  peer- 
ing into  the  skies,  she  held  the  richly  illuminated  Lord's 
Prayer  before  the  eyes  of  the  two  Barb£s  and  before  the 
sacred  emblems.  With  untrembling  grasp  she  kept  it 
suspended  in  that  streaming  flame  of  whitest  light.  The 
hand  which  had  created  it  out  of  purple  and  gold  and 


HOLY  COMMUNION.  22$ 

silver  and  dragon's  blood,  each  tint  of  which  now  shone 
as  never  before,  was  baptized  in  splendor  from  above. 
In  silence  she  partook  of  the  bread  of  the  communion. 
The  wine  was  near  her  lips,  when  a  shout  from  without 
penetrated  the  cavern. 

The  Barbes  lifted  the  bread  and  the  wine  and  the 
parchment  from  the  altar-table.  The  shout  of  alarm  was 
repeated. 

"  An  enemy  has  been  seen  by  the  watchman  !  An 
enemy  !  !  " 

Every  eye  discerned  the  crisis.  Every  Waldensian 
discovered  a  missile  in  each  rock  which  had  helped  to 
constitute  the  altar- table  of  the  Lord.  Down  into  the 
darkness  of  the  pines,  which  was  broken  into  by  the 
same  moonlight  which  had  illuminated  the  emblems  and 
the  parchment,  Alke  hurled  the  first  stone. 

In  an  hour  the  communing  church  had  become  the 
church  militant ;  the  altar-table  had  been  thrown,  stone 
after  stone,  into  the  gorge  below.  At  the  bottom  there 
lay  the  body  of  a  disguised  Capuchin,  whose  brutal  face 
was  scarred  by  the  rock  which  had  killed  him ;  and  the 
worshippers  who  had  been  made  sure  of  an  attack  from 
above  were  hurrying  to  outrun  the  dawn,  as  they  fled 
homeward. 


CHAPTER   XX. 

MARIGNANO. 
C'est  mon.fils  glorieux  et  triomphant  C6sar.  — LOUISE  OF  SAVOY. 

TO  those  observant  and  thoughtful  Frenchmen  who 
honored  the  memory  of  their  late  sovereign  Louis 
XII.,  the  coronation  of  Francis  I.  in  the  Cathedral  of 
Rheims  appeared  to  be  an  invitation  to  every  romantic 
and  adventurous  young  man  to  join  a  standard  which 
had  been  blessed  on  that  occasion  by  Robert  de  Lenon- 
court,  Archbishop  of  Paris,  and  instantly  made  an  object 
of  adoration  by  all  the  feudatories  and  vassals  who  shared 
with  the  army  a  dislike  of  the  English  alliance,  and  the 
poets  and  courtiers  whose  ardor  saw  before  them  a  path 
of  glory.  Not  the  least  enthusiastic  of  those  whose  youth 
now  saw  an  end  of  the  inglorious  schemes  which  so 
honored  the  opinions  of  Henry  VIII.,  was  the  knight 
Ami.  Especially  was  he  gratified  at  the  fact  that  Chan- 
cellor Duprat,  for  whom  he  felt  as  active  a  dislike  as  he 
had  for  the  English  sovereign,  had  not  succeeded  in  de- 
feating the  intention  of  Francis  I.,  of  making  the  Duke  of 
Bourbon  Constable  of  France. 

Throughout  all  the  jousts  and  tourneys,  processions 
and  banquets,  the  faithful  eye  of  Ami,  never  blinded 
by  the  beauty  of  the  handsome  king,  saw  two  things 
ahead,  —  the  first,  the  effect  of  the  idea  within  the 


MARIGNANO.  22$ 

mind  of  Francis  I.  of  entering  Italy  to  recapture  the 
Duchy  of  Milan ;  the  second,  a  rapidly  swelling  debt 
which  such  pomp  and  plans  were  creating,  and  which 
had  nothing  to  appeal  to  save  an  exhausted  treasury  and 
an  already  overtaxed  people. 

"  I  can  never  forget  the  labor  and  sufferings  of  the 
peasant  at  Chilly,"  said  he  one  day  to  the  king,  when 
his  Majesty  laughed  at  his  own  royal  extravagance. 

"Well,"  replied  the  amused  monarch,  "we  will  re- 
create Charlemagne's  palace  here,  and  greater  than 
Arthur's  knights  shall  rule  at  our  court.  The  women 
shall  be  goddesses,  if  need  be,  though  some  of  them 
are  frail !  " 

Ami  was  not  encouraged,  when  he  was  allowed  to  hear 
the  plans  of  Louise  of  Savoy  and  Chancellor  Duprat. 
"  Every  objection  on  the  part  of  the  populace  will  give 
way  before  the  reappearance  of  royal  power,"  said  Du- 
prat. "We  have  hitherto  asked  the  English  to  make 
France  respectable  in  her  own  eyes.  We  will  now 
create  self-respect.  Our  Parliament  will  pay  for  a 
magnificent  success ;  they  will  refuse  to  pay  for  a  dull 
and  commonplace  throne,  which  is  neither  a  success  nor 
a  failure." 

To  all  this,  Louise  of  Savoy,  whom  the  king  had 
created  Duchesse,  whose  revenues  had  been  exhausted 
and  to  whom  the  palace  of  Amboise  had  been  given, 
assented,  while  she  protested  against  the  bestowment  of 
the  title  of  "  Constable"  on  Bourbon. 

One  day,  Nouvisset  —  a  gossip  who  never  gossiped 
unwisely  —  made  Ami  acquainted  with  the  peculiarly 
interesting  facts  which  bound  Marguerite,  the  king's 
sister,  to  the  Duke  of  Bourbon,  and  repulsed  the  haughty 
mother  from  so  proud  a  courtier.  Why  was  he  made 
Constable  ? 

"  I  know,"  said  the  young  man,  "  that  it  was  done  to 
please  the  gracious  Madame  Marguerite." 
VOL.  i.  —  1 5 


226  MONK  AND  KNIGHT. 

"Yes  !  "  said  Nouvisset,  "neither  Duprat  nor  his  Maj- 
esty's mother  loves  Bourbon  as  a  constable." 

"  I  discern  in  the  king  himself  a  disposition  to  under- 
rate Constable  Bourbon." 

"  You  are  innocent  of  what  you  ought  to  know.  I  will 
tell  you.  The  king's  disposition  to  quarrel  with  so  strong 
a  man  began  to  show  itself  at  Amboise.  It  is  only  another 
love-affair,  —  indeed,  everything  is  love  here.  Politics 
is  the  art  of  getting  into  love  and  getting  out  again. 
Statesmanship  is  the  art  of  keeping  out  altogether,  Ami !  " 

"  Let  me  have  the  story,"  begged  the  impatient  knight. 

"  It  is  this.  When  he  was  plain  Charles  de  Montpen- 
sier,  the  man  who  is  now  constable  fell  in  love.  You 
would  not  think  such  a  stiff,  proud,  chilly  person  could 
melt  with  passion.  But  he  loved  the  daughter  of  our 
new  duchesse, —  he  loved  even  Marguerite.  Young  Duke 
Francis  used  to  go  about  Amboise  with  Gouffier,  calling 
his  sister  i  Pearl  beyond  price ; '  and  under  the  lilacs 
young  Montpensier  —  think  of  it !  —  Due  de  Bourbon 
was  .making  love  to  her  who  is  now  Madame  !  Oh,  tem- 
pera mutant,  Ami !  Excited  by  Gouffier,  who  also  was 
mad  with  love  for  her,  Francis,  who  never  liked  Mont- 
pensier as  he  did  the  other  young  nobles,  Gouffier  and 
Vaudenesse,  challenged  him.  The  combat  was  pre- 
vented, and  Charles  de  Montpensier  left  the  court  and 
the  heart-broken  Marguerite."  Nouvisset  hesitated,  and 
then  added  :  "  All  this  while  Madame  Louise  —  Duchesse  / 

—  was  in  love  with  Vaudenesse,  who  threw  off  his  gray 
and  green  and  wore  the  colors  of  Madame  d'Angouleme 

—  Dtichesse!     It  was  now  the  chance  of  M.  de  Gie, 
who  also  loved   her — oh,  France  is  a  vast  love-affair, 
Ami !  —  it  was  now  his  chance  to  rid  Amboise  of  M.  de 
Vaudenesse,  which  he  easily  did  after  the  night  in  which 
the  young  noble  was  found  in  the  gallery." 

"What  about  the  king's  mother,  Louise  of  Savoy?" 
asked  Ami,  intently. 


MARIGNANO.  22? 

."The  Duchesse !  Yes;  she  was  compensated.  She 
always  will  be,  mark  me,  Ami !  "  The  eyes  of  Nouvisset 
twinkled  like  bright,  happy  stars.  "  It  must  always  be 
remembered  in  your  calculations  that  the  Due  de  Bour- 
bon loved  the  «  Pearl  beyond  price.'  " 

Ami  had  another  fact  at  hand  for  future  use,  when  by 
the  side  of  Bourbon  Constable  stood  Odet  de  Foix,  Sire 
de  Lautrec,  who  had  now  been  made  ruler  of  Guienne, 
and  Bonnivet,  who  was  now  Admiral  of  the  Fleet. 

Duprat  he  distrusted  and  hated ;  Bourbon's  ability  had 
captivated  him  ;  Bonnivet —  formerly  plain  Gouffier  who 
had  already  instigated  Francis  I.  to  attack  Bourbon,  who 
was  never  able  to  allow  that  wound  made  in  the  friend- 
ship between  the  king  and  the  duke  to  be  healed  — 
seemed  to  Ami  to  be  a  jealous,  self- asserting,  inefficient 
man.  How  easily  jealousy  in  another  finds  the  toes  of 
our  own  ! 

"  The  pretence  !  "  said  Ami  confidentially  to  Nouvisset, 
when  they  came  together  at  a  later  hour  at  the  queen's 
reception,  and  beheld  Bonnivet's  pallor,  when  the  latter 
saw  the  blush  upon  the  face  of  Marguerite  as  the  mag- 
nificent Bourbon  approached  her,  —  "  the  pretence  !  I 
should  smite  him  if  I  were  the  duke." 

"  The  duke's  thought  is  upon  some  one  more  important 
to  him  than  even  the  Admiral  Bonnivet,  Ami.  Mark 
the  regret  on  the  face  of  Marguerite,  our  beautiful  Du- 
chesse d'Alencon,"  whispered  Nouvisset.  "  Look  at  that 
selfish  passion  in  her  mother's  eye ;  see  the  eye  of  the 
Duchesse  d'Angouleme.  Ah !  Ami,  there  is  another 
love-story  in  all  this.  Madame  d'Angouleme  loves  her 
daughter's  lover,  Bourbon  !  " 

Ami  was  at  that  juncture  more  nearly  convinced  than 
ever  that  statesmanship  in  France,  at  least  at  that  hour, 
was  the  art  of  keeping  out  of  love  altogether.  He  felt  a 
twinge  of  shame  that  he  himself  had  ever  felt  deeply 
about  the  beautiful  sister  of  the  king. 


228  MONK  AND  KNIGHT. 

The  whole  court  was  there.  It  was  the  hour  in  the 
annals  of  the  French  soldiery  which  could  boast  of  men 
known  as  Chevalier  Bayard  and  Constable  Due  de  Bour- 
bon. The  battle-field  of  Marignano  was  just  ahead,  and 
the  ardent  spirits  of  France  were  shouting,  when  the 
Duchesse  d'Alengon —  his  sighing,  regretful  Marguerite 
de  Valois  of  other  days  —  caught  sight  of  the  brilliant 
commander,  her  Due  de  Bourbon,  whose  plume  of  white 
and  crimson  feathers  came  close  to  the  window  where 
stood  the  unhappy  woman  and  her  husband,  known  in 
French  history  as  Due  d'Alencon. 

Ami  turned  from  them  at  once  when  he  saw  Margue- 
rite's eyes  visit  the  silvered  sash  and  begemmed  poniard 
of  the  constable  with  a  shuddering  look  of  pride,  and 
the  inferior  personage  at  her  side  with  a  smile  of  pity. 
The  young  knight's  eye  paused  for  an  instant  upon  the 
glittering  casque  of  Bourbon,  and  the  flushed  cheek  of 
his  jealous  rival,  Bonnivet ;  then,  with  the  rest  of  the 
king's  suite,  he  was  himself  lost  for  a  moment  amid  the 
velvet  and  gold,  until  he  was  startled  to  hear  the  King 
Francis  I.  say,  — 

"  Too  magnificent  is  our  constable.  But,  Ami,  the 
Duchy  of  Milan  shall  be  ours,  —  mine  J" 

The  emphasis  was  on  the  word  "  mine."  The  proud 
Francis  was  himself  rankling  with  envy;  but  yet  he 
knew  that  he  must  use  Bourbon  and  be  patient. 

"And,"  said  he  to  Ami,  to  whom  by  this  time  he 
sought  to  explain  everything,  "  I  have  assented  to  the 
suggestion  of  the  Chancellor  Duprat  to  multiply  the  judi- 
cial offices  which  may  be  for  sale." 

At  once  the  king  saw  that  a  better  statesmanship  than 
his  was  offended. 

"  Frown  not  upon  his  Majesty  !  It  is  done.  Parlia- 
ment must  learn  that  the  most  chivalrous  army  which 
ever  crossed  the  Alps  shall  be  supported." 

Too  young  as  yet  in  his  relations  to  Francis  I.  as  his 


MARIGNANO.  22Q 

king,  to  oppose  vigorously,  and  just  sufficiently  youthful 
to  partake  of  the  excited  hope  that  the  throne  of  his 
royal  friend  might  become  the  greatest  in  Europe,  Ami 
was  silent,  while  Louise  of  Savoy  was  made  Queen 
Regent,  and  the  army  whose  vanguard  was  now  under 
command  of  Bourbon  was  made  ready  to  set  out  for 
Italy. 

Close  to  the  sovereign  rode  Ami,  whose  figure  and 
whose  wise  handling  of  his  delicate  responsibilities  had 
much  of  the  elegance  of  Bourbon,  but  more  of  the 
grace  of  Bayard,  who,  as  Lieutenant- General  of  Dauphiny, 
also  rode  near  the  king. 

"  It  is  probable,"  Nouvisset  had  said  to  Ami,  as  they 
parted,  "  that  this  may  be  a  victory  for  you.  Let  our 
king  triumph  while  he  may.  Some  day,  believe  me," 
and  the  eyes  of  the  lame  knight,  who  hobbled  by  Ami's 
side,  gleamed  with  prophecy,  "  the  burghers  will  some 
day  rise  against  feudal  nobles  and  their  kings ;  then  the 
triumph  will  be  theirs." 

"  Our  king  does  not  consult  with  England.  France  is 
her  own  mistress  now,"  cried  old  Trivulcio  the  censor,  as 
he  learned  that  both  Wolsey  and  Henry  VIII.  were  in- 
dignant at  Francis  I.,  and  at  his  contemptuous  neglect  of 
them  in  this  expedition. 

Ami  looked  about  when  they  left  Lyons  on  that  day  of 
July,  1515,  and  he  saw  forty  thousand  men  with  trains  of 
artillery;  but  it  was  he  alone  who  began  to  worry  the 
king  with  questions  as  to  the  difficulty  in  crossing  the 
Alps.  The  king  answered  by  calling  his  attention  to  the 
allies  and  their  strength.  There  was  Octavian  Fregoso, 
doge  of  Genoa;  but  Ami  had  found  out  that  he  and 
D'Alviano,  general  of  the  Venetians,  knew  nothing  what- 
ever of  the  problem.  News  came  that  Cardinal  Sion 
was  rousing  the  Swiss  to  a  pitch  of  crusading  fury  against 
the  conquest.  Twenty  thousand  Swiss  under  Colonna 
were  guarding  the  passes.  Between  Mont  Cenis  and 


230  MONK  AND  KNIGHT. 

Mont  Genevre  were  soldiers  awaiting  the  opportunity  to 
overwhelm  horsemen  and  ordnance.  Ami  could  not  be 
silent,  though  Louise  of  Savoy  had  called  him  "  a  trouble- 
some youth."  Only  Chevalier  Bayard  was  wise  enough, 
amid  the  enthusiasm  of  the  advancing  host,  to  listen  to 
Ami's  suggestion  that  they  find  out  from  the  shepherds  of 
the  Alps  the  unknown  passes. 

"  Susa  is  guarded  and  is  impassable,"  said  he. 

Oh,  if  this  Waldensian  had  at  that  hour  foreseen  the 
future,  how  carefully  he  might  have  studied  those  road- 
ways which  threaded  the  mountain  fastnesses,  for  he  was 
not  far  from  his  old  home  ! 

The  August  snows  were  melting,  and  they  had  come 
upon  the  brown  rocks  which  were  beginning  to  grow 
insurmountable,  when  Ami  with  a  vassal  of  the  Comte 
de  Moretto,  a  cousin  of  Bayard,  went  forth  from  the  rest 
to  find  a  shepherd. 

"You  look  like  the  Piedmontese,"  said  the  chamois- 
hunter,  with  whom  the  disguised  Ami  soon  found  himself 
in  interesting  conversation.  There  was  an  all-pervading 
silence  about  the  young  knight,  as  he  thought  of  his  baby- 
hood, and  then,  jealous  again  of  his  own  self-consciousness, 
put  the  thought  aside  forever. 

The  route  to  the  plain  was  at  length  accurately  de- 
scribed by  the  shepherd.  Ami's  brain  was  a  map,  in 
which  Lautrec  and  Navarro  found  all  needed  information, 
when,  by  order  of  the  Council,  they  set  out  to  survey  the 
pass.  The  king  embraced  Ami,  and  Bayard  blessed  him, 
when  they  returned  and  reported  the  task  of  crossing  by 
way  of  the  Guillestre  ledge  entirely  practicable. 

"  The  astrologer  said  it ! "  remarked  Francis  I.  to 
Bayard,  as  Bourbon  led  on  the  vanguard  toward  the 
ford,  and  detachments  were  sent  to  hold  the  attention  of 
the  foe  at  Mont  Cenis  and  Mont  Genevre. 

But  the  supreme  trial  was  now  coming  to  Ami. 

Even  the  king  grew  haughty  and  cold,  and  Bonnivet 


MARIGNANO. 

was  disdainful  and  insulting,  as  the  army,  after  reaching 
the  most  perilous  ravines,  found  itself  crawling  along, 
hand  over  hand,  through  difficulties  unimagined,  dragging 
the  heavy  artillery  up  the  rugged  slopes  of  the  mountains. 

"  Your  astrologer,  Sire,  ought  to  be  made  to  carry  a 
horse  over  this  abyss,"  said  the  wrathful  admiral,  address- 
ing his  Majesty,  as  he  looked  with  contempt  upon  Ami. 

Bayard  alone  kept  silent,  while  the  king  swore,  and 
Talmond  and  Imbercourt  reiterated  the  oaths  of  Bonni- 
vet,  whom  at  length  the  Constable  Bourbon  silenced, 
while  the  steep  declivities  confronted  them  from  the 
other  side.  Levelling  roads  through  flinty  rock ;  closely 
holding  to  one  another,  as  they  rounded  a  projecting 
cliff;  bridging  abysses  and  crossing  torrents,  they  be- 
held horse  after  horse  tumble  into  the  depths  below, 
until  at  length  Ami's  name,  for  five  days  an  epithet  of 
scorn,  was  the  one  name  which  the  knightly  Bayard 
spoke  lovingly  to  the  king's  marshal,  De  Chabannes.  At 
length  they  discovered  themselves  safe  in  the  territory  of 
the  Marquis  de  Saluzzo,  with  the  Alps  behind  them. 

"  Prosper  Colonna  !  "  said  the  invincible  Ami,  who  had 
made  another  discovery,  "  the  arrogant  Colonna  !  "  Ami 
pointed  toward  Villa  Franca,  where  Colonna,  the  Pope's 
commander,  was  dining. 

Bayard  and  Imbercourt  at  once  dashed  on,  with 
French  chivalry  behind  them,  to  carry  the  unwelcome 
news  to  this  hostile  warrior,  that  his  confederates  must 
meet  an  army  and  a  king  which  had  already  put  the  Alps 
between  them  and  retreat. 

Soon  a  sword  was  in  Bayard's  hand,  and  Andalusian 
horses,  with  jewels  and  plate,  were  possessed  by  the 
soldiers. 

September  13  came.  Cardinal  Sion's  furious  audiences 
were  now  surging  before  the  Cathedral  at  Milan,  —  an 
army  filled  with  the  hope  of  joining  forces  with  Naples. 
No  eloquence,  however,  could  hurl  back  the  French  ad- 


232  MONK  AND  KNIGHT. 

vance.  Negotiations  and  parleys  had  failed.  The  elo- 
quent cardinal  at  last  shouted, — 

"  Seize  your  spears  ;  sound  your  drums  !  " 

It  was  three  o'clock.  Dust  and  heat  surrounded  the 
advanced  guard  of  the  French.  Ami,  who  had  scouted 
the  plain,  and  was  now  dripping  with  water,  with  which 
he  was  drenched  in  the  canals  which  he  had  swum, 
crowded  into  the  presence  of  Bourbon,  announced  the 
enemy,  and  springing  into  his  armor  was  soon  with  the 
constable  in  the  presence  of  the  king. 

"  Oh,  Ami,"  said  his  Majesty,  "  the  astrologer  said  it !  " 

"  The  Swiss  are  coming,  Sire  ! "  was  Ami's  reply,  when 
the  king  sprang  into  his  saddle  and  flew  toward  the 
enemy  with  his  body-guard. 

It  was  Ami's  first  battle.  Enthroned  upon  the  king's 
heart,  as  never  before,  he  felt  himself  a  sovereign.  True, 
as  he  believed  himself  to  have  been,  to  the  higher  states- 
manship to  which  he  was  as  yet  sure  his  sovereign  would 
soon  assent,  the  conflict  seemed  his  own.  Attached  to 
Bourbon,  and  indignant  at  the  jealousy  of  Bonnivet,  he 
was  in  rapture  when  he  saw  the  golden  pommel  of  the 
constable's  sword  lifted  high  above  the  dust-cloud  by 
that  strong  hand.  Ever  remembering  Nouvisset,  and  not 
forgetful  that  Louise  of  Savoy  had  regarded  himself  a 
failure  as  a  page,  he  thirsted  for  another  opportunity  for 
the  exhibition  of  wisdom  or  valor.  Already  hostile  to 
this  particular  plan  of  Leo  X.  and  proud  of  his  sovereign, 
he  had  pledged  every  drop  of  his  blood  to  his  king's 
desire,  —  the  recovery  of  the  Duchy  of  Milan. 

It  seemed  only  a  brief,  agonizing  hour  to  the  young 
knight. 

The  bareheaded  Swiss,  unshod  and  furious,  leaped  at 
once  against  the  cooler  intrepidity  of  France,  which  was 
now  throbbing  with  the  heart  of  youth.  Ami  could  not 
but  admire  them,  as  the  heavy  guns  discharged  their  shot 
and  fire  against  the  immovable  mountaineers.  Lanz- 


MARIGNANO.  233 

knechts  by  ranks  fell  back  into  the  ditch  to  die  before 
the  courageous  Swiss.  Four  guns  fell  into  their  hands, 
while  Ami  hurried  to  the  constable  to  tell  him  that  the 
German  allies  had  feared  treachery  and  were  therefore 
wavering. 

"  Only  the  king  may  rally  them,"  said  the  commander. 
"  They  must  see  the  King  of  France." 

Francis  I.,  with  Ami  at  his  side,  now  rushed  forward 
with  these  soldiers  who  had  fought  under  the  black 
banner  of  their  own  king.  Ami  gave  to  the  tired  king, 
who  was  righting  on  foot,  his  unbroken  pike,  for  the 
fragment  to  which  his  Majesty  still  held. 

"  I  could  give  you  my  heart,"  said  the  knight. 

"The  astrologer  said  it ! "  cried  the  king,  tears  in  his 
throat,  as  he  saw  how  the  lanzknechts  now  rallied,  and 
the  Swiss  faltered  at  the  sight. 

Unafraid  of  the  mountain  chivalry,  the  mountaineers 
beat  back  the  tired  horses  of  the  French.  Through  the 
top  of  the  king's  helmet  was  driven  a  murderous  pike. 
The  French  were  roused  again.  Back  the  enemy  fell, 
until  Swiss  determination  paused  in  the  hope  of  acknowl- 
edged victory. 

"  Now,"  shouted  Ami,  as  if  he  had  assumed  com- 
mand of  the  king,  —  "  now  for  our  gendarmes  to  charge 
them  ! " 

Francis  I.,  on  the  instant,  made  the  charge ;  and  the 
four  thousand  foes  cried,  "  France  !  France  !  "  as  they 
surrendered. 

Night  had  come ;  it  was  all  confusion  and  death. 
Both  armies  were  misled  by  the  soldiers  of  either  side, 
bearing,  as  they  both  did,  the  white  cross.  Even  the 
king,  but  for  Ami's  cry,  "  It  is  the  foe,  the  foe  !  "  would 
have  been  captured,  as  he  started  on  horseback  into 
a  wilderness  of  hostile  pikes. 

Under  the  moonlight,  within  an  area  of  groans  and 
sighing,  the  faithful  young  knight  was  soon  watching  over 


234  MONK  AND  KNIGHT. 

the  king,  while  he  sat  awake,  when  the  cornets  de  vache 
of  the  Swiss  sounded,  and  the  French  trumpets  pealed 
forth,  or  while  he  slept  a  little  on  a  gun-carriage,  assured 
that  Bayard  had  returned,  after  his  adventure,  to  the 
French  lines. 

The  Constable  Bourbon  was  a  silent  throne  of  power. 

"Put  out  the  lights!"  whispered  Ami,  when  in  the 
entangled  condition  of  the  armies  he  descried  a  Swiss 
battalion  resting  perilously  near  the  king.  The  matches 
were  relighted  but  once  in  the  long  hours  which  followed. 

"  Water  !  "  said  his  Majesty,  —  "a  drink  for  a  thirsty 
king,  Ami  !  " 

Ami  produced  a  helmet ;  and  the  king  was  soon  pre- 
sented with  a  draught,  which  he  refused  to  take  when 
in  the  flickering  light  he  saw  that  it  was  red  with  blood. 

Morning  flamed  her  ruddy  signals  for  both  armies. 
The  ditch  gave  the  French  an  advantage  valuable  be- 
yond estimate.  But  backward  again  fell  the  lanzknechts ; 
twenty  thousand  were  in  disorder ;  the  Swiss  broke  into 
the  quarters  of  Bourbon. 

The  critical  moment  had  come.  Now  the  French 
poured  forth  volleys  of  flame  into  the  breasts  of  the  foe. 
Attacked  from  the  rear,  the  Due  d'Alencon  routed 
them ;  stormed  at  in  front,  the  wall  of  infantry  began 
to  falter. 

"  D'Alviano  !  D'Alviano  !  "  shouted  Ami  to  his  king, 
who  needed  but  the  assurance  that  his  Venetian  ally  was 
coming,  to  increase  his  own  valor. 

Inch  by  inch,  before  Bourbon  and  his  vanguard,  who 
were  roused  by  the  sight  of  the  king  fighting  midst  dust 
and  heat,  —  fighting  as  a  true  knight,  —  did  the  Swiss 
army  yield.  Man  by  man  did  they  fall  before  the  Gas- 
con cross-bowmen,  until  Trivulcio  cried,  "  It  is  a  battle 
of  giants  ;  I  have  seen  only  battles  of  pygmies  hitherto  ;  " 
and  looking  about  on  a  field  on  which  lay  six  thousand 
dead  and  dying  Frenchmen  and  fourteen  thousand 


MARIGNANO. 

mountaineers,  —  a  field  from  which  the  hitherto  invin- 
cible Swiss  were  scattering,  —  Ami  said,  as  he  approached 
the  king,  — 

"  Sire,  it  is  your  triumph  !  It  is  no  longer  a  battle, 
but  a  victory." 

u  Ami,"  answered  his  Majesty,  "  the  astrologer  said  it ! " 

Before  an  hour  had  gone,  that  well-known  message 
had  been  sent  from  the  royal  son  to  his  proud  mother, 
Louise  of  Savoy,  containing  every  evidence  of  the 
mingled  flippancy,  arrogance,  and  nobility  of  the  king's 
character. 

Before  night  had  come  Bayard  had  knighted  Francis  I. 
on  the  battle-field  of  Marignano ;  and  as  soon  as  the 
most  alert  policy  could  dictate  it,  Leo  X.  had  despatched 
a  nuncio,  who  carried  an  invitation  to  the  conqueror, 
which  was  destined  to  be  answered  by  the  appearance  of 
the  French  King  before  his  Holiness  at  Bologna. 


CHAPTER  XXI. 

POPE,    KING,    AND   KNIGHT. 
Godiamoci  il  papato,  poiche  Dio  ci  1'  ha  dato  !  —  LEO  X. 

DECEMBER  8  had  come  ;  and  pausing  near  Bologna, 
the  victor  of  Marignano  saw  before  him  the  mem- 
bers of  the  Sacred  College,  who  had  advanced  just  beyond 
the  gate  of  San  Felice  to  meet  him.  He  had  entered 
Milan,  October  16,  and  his  route  from  that  hour  had  been 
that  of  an  acknowledged  conqueror. 

What  a  pathway  of  thorns  had  Ami  travelled,  in  his 
conversations  with  the  king  ! 

Proud  of  his  sovereign,  and  zealous  for  the  success  of  his 
reign,  the  pupil  of  Nouvisset,  who  had  already  listened  to 
the  enkindling  words  of  the  reformer  Lefevre,  was  made 
painfully  aware  that  Francis  I.  had  no  comprehension 
whatever  of  the  subtle  influence  which  had  been  the 
impulse  of  the  Renaissance  and  was  now  to  become  the 
soul  of  the  Reformation.  Of  course,  Ami  still  believed 
in  what  were  known  as  the  regularly  constituted  authori- 
ties. He  had  not  entertained  an  idea  of  such  a  trans- 
formation in  the  Church  as  would  affect  the  existence  of 
the  papacy,  or  even  the  righteous  policies  of  his  Holi- 
ness. Something,  however,  he  was  sure  must  be  done  so 
to  purify  the  institution  that  it  should  become  more  wor- 
thy to  exercise  over  men's  minds  the  authority  which  it 
so  loudly  professed.  In  the  dust  and  heat  of  Marignano, 


POPE,   KING,   AND  KNIGHT. 

the  king  had  apparently  lost  every  sympathy  with  such  a 
change  as  had  formerly  received  his  faltering  praise. 

Indeed,  as  they  neared  the  confines  of  the  Pope's  ter- 
ritory, the  brilliancy  of  the  victory  behind  him  and  the 
fascinating  splendor  of  the  Sovereign  Pontiff,  whom  he 
was  about  to  meet,  appeared  so  to  bewilder  his  dreamy 
and  luxurious  mind,  that  it  was  impossible  for  Ami  to 
get  a  hearing  for  the  serious  interests  of  his  country 
and  time. 

"  Again  you  are  gloomy,  —  you  who  came  to  be  my 
happiness?  Is  not  Marignano  enough  for  you?  Well, 
then,  I  will  show  you  a  pope  who  will  never  again  enter 
into  an  Italian  league  against  me,  —  a  pope,  Ami,  who 
beats  us  all  in  festivals  and  in  playing  the  Ciceronian. 
Come,  good  cheer,  as  the  English  say !  Ami,  good 
cheer  !  " 

The  king  was  in  his  happiest  mood,  and  his  over- 
flowing joy  echoed  with  laughter  which  died  away  in 
smiles  upon  the  faces  of  the  barons,  who,  close  be- 
hind the  Chancellor  Duprat,  rode  proudly  toward  the 
place  where  they  were  to  meet  the  humiliated  but  wary 
Pope. 

When  Duprat's  attention  was  a  little  diverted,  Ami 
ventured  to  ask,  "  Sire,  why  did  his  Holiness  prefer 
Bologna  to  Rome  itself?  " 

"  '  Ubi  papa,  ubi  Roma,'  "  answered  the  king ;  and  then, 
as  if  he  himself  were  not  quite  satisfied  with  this  some- 
what ineffective  saw,  he  added,  "  His  Holiness  knew  it  to 
be  too  much  to  ask  of  a  victorious  king  that  he  should 
endure  a  journey  to  Rome,  Ami !  " 

"Sire,  your  minister  believes  that?  " 

"  He  does,"  said  Francis  I.,  looking  swiftly  back  upon 
the  golden-vestured  attendants ;  "  but,  Ami,  you  do  not 
believe  it." 

"  Your  Majesty,"  said  Ami,  with  grave  affectionateness, 
—  "  your  Majesty  would  not  keep  himself  unaware  that 


238  MONK  AND  KNIGHT. 

Pope  Leo  X.  fears  that  you  may  desire  to  enter  Naples ; 
and  Rome  is  a  long  way  toward  Naples." 

Pope  Leo  X.  had  prevented  any  display  of  French 
power  in  Rome. 

Then  was  Francis  I.  enraged  at  his  Holiness  and  at 
Duprat,  —  at  the  one,  because  of  his  shrewdness  in  making 
a  proposition  which  had  led  him  toward  Bologna ;  at  the 
other,  because  of  his  stupid  advice,  which  had  led  the 
French  monarch  to  accept  that  proposition. 

"  Do  you  know  that  Leo  X.  really  fears  me?  "  eagerly 
asked  the  king,  as  he  remembered  that  Duprat,  the  ser- 
vant, and  Louise,  his  mother,  were  so  warmly  attached  to 
the  Church  that  they  were  constantly  overestimating  popes 
and  underestimating  everything  else. 

"  I  only  know  of  the  conversation  which  occurred  be- 
tween the  Venetian,  Marino  Giorgi,  and  the  Pope,"  dryly 
answered  Ami. 

"  Let  me  hear  it  again  !  "  demanded  the  dignity  of  the 
sovereign. 

Ami  proceeded,  much  as  the  historians  do,  to  relate 
what  had  been  a  common  report  at  Viterbo,  that  the  Vene- 
tian ambassador  at  Rome,  before  the  battle  had  taken 
place,  seeing  that  Leo  X.  was  deeply  interested  in  the 
success  of  the  Swiss  arms,  dared  to  remark  to  his  Holi- 
ness, "  The  Most  Christian  King  has  a  warlike  and  well- 
caparisoned  army;  the  Swiss  are  not  mounted  or  well 
appointed ;  "  and  that  to  this  the  pontiff  replied  by  pro- 
testing that  the  Swiss  were  quite  intrepid ;  to  which  the 
Venetian  made  the  rejoinder,  "  Were  it  not  better  for 
them  to  illustrate  their  valor  in  fighting  against  your  com- 
mon foe,  —  the  infidel  Turk?  " 

Francis  I.  broke  into  Ami's  story  with  the  question  : 
"But  what  said  the  Pope  after  the  battle  was  fought? 
What  said  he  about  my  triumph?" 

"Well,"  continued  the  knight,  "everybody  in  Rome 
knew  that  the  victory  was  yours,  Sire,  when  Marino  stalked 


POPE,   KING,   AND   KNIGHT.  239 

to  the  Holy  Father  with  such  demonstrations.  He  even 
made  the  chamberlain  wake  his  Holiness  out  of  sleep, 
after  which  awakening,  the  Pope,  who  was  but  half  dressed 
as  they  say,  heard  the  unwelcome  truth ;  and  he  said  with 
evident  fear,  '  What  will  be  the  result?  '  " 

"What  did  the  Venetian  tell  him?"  quickly  inquired 
the  king. 

"  This :  that  Venice  all  the  while  was  with  the  Most 
Christian  King,  and  that  their  Hely  Father  could  not 
suffer  at  the  hands  of  such  a  son  of  the  Church." 

"And  the  Pope?" 

"  He  answered  very  gloomily,  but,  Sire,  as  I  think,  very 
craftily ;  for  he  said, '  We  will  see  ;  we  will  place  ourselves 
in  his  hands  and  sue  for  his  love.'  " 

"Then,"  said  Francis  I.,  with  great  hauteur,  —  "  then, 
Ami,  we  will  be  generous.  None  so  gracefully  as  a  vic- 
tor may  be  truly  magnanimous." 

"  Alas,  Sire  !  even  you  cannot  afford  to  forget  that  his 
Holiness  is  a  shrewd  politician,  and  that  your  chancellor 
leans  strongly  toward  the  Church." 

Ami  was  already  acquainted  with  his  king;  and  this 
outburst  of  proffered  magnanimity  which  he  had  just 
heard  did  not  surprise  him.  There  was  just  one  element 
lacking  in  it  all,  which  Ami's  character,  under  such  un- 
strained circumstances,  was  sure  to  miss,  —  the  element 
which  always  must  be  present  to  redeem  magnanimity 
from  being  only  indolent  indifference,  —  and  that  was 
conscience. 

The  king  was  growing  restive  under  Ami's  words ;  and 
yet  he  was  not  content  to  abridge  the  freedom  which  the 
young  knight  used.  Unpleasant  information  from  this 
source  had  often  proved  most  valuable.  Ami  could  not 
forget  that  before  the  Pope  had  entered  into  the  Italian 
alliance,  no  less  a  scholar  than  the  already  eminent  Wil- 
liam Bude",  with  whom  we  shall  become  more  familiar  at 
a  later  date,  had  been  sent  by  Francis  I.  to  his  Holiness, 


240  MONK  AND  KNIGHT. 

bearing  many  offers  of  profitable  marriages  and  alluring 
pledges  to  be  made  good  if  the  Holy  Father  would  be  so 
minded  as  not  to  oppose  the  king's  invasion  of  Italy. 

"  You,  my  sovereign,  had  confidence  in  the  ability  and 
learning  of  the  excellent  BudeV'  remarked  Ami. 

"  Bude  is  one  of  your  scholars,"  was  the  brief  saying  of 
the  king. 

"  An  ornament  of  your  kingdom,  Sire,  and  a  man  of 
the  reforming  party.  He  is  with  Lefevre,  Berquin,  and 
Farel." 

"  He  is  an  innocent  man  of  learning,"  said  Francis  I., 
who  now  saw  that  the  knight  was  anxious  to  impress  his 
king  with  his  own  opinion  of  the  Pope's  wariness  and 
skill.  "  He  is  too  pious  for  an  ambassador,  Ami." 

"  And  the  pontiff  was  too  much  a  master  of  intrigue 
for  his  simple  honesty,"  added  the  knight.  "  Think  you 
that  the  Holy  Father  knew  that  Bud£'s  learning  had 
probably  led  him  to  consort  with  the  men  of  reform?  " 

"Learning?  What  reform?"  brusquely  answered 
Francis.  "  His  Holiness,  as  you  shall  see,  is  more 
learned  than  Berquin,  Bude",  and  Lefevre  taken  together. 
The  papacy  and  the  kingdom  of  France  fear  nothing." 

Again  Ami  was  amazed  at  the  growing  conceit  of  his 
king,  and  at  the  disposition  within  him  to  listen  with 
amiableness  to  the  stipulations  of  Rome.  All  notions  of 
counting  in  the  reforming  movement  among  the  forces 
or  problems  of  his  time  seemed  to  have  fled  from  the 
royal  brain. 

"  Ami,  you  have  a  cloud  upon  your  soul." 

"  None  upon  my  conscience,  your  Majesty,"  was  the 
swiftly  spoken  answer  of  the  young  knight. 

"  Oh,  that  is  knightly  enough  !  "  laughed  the  king  ;  and 
he  proceeded  to  say,  "  You  would  have  me  attend  to  the 
vaporings  of  my  enemies,  would  you,  Ami?  " 

The  knight  straightened  in  his  saddle.  The  thirty 
cardinals  who  had  already  been  in  sight  for  some  min- 


POPE,   KING,   AND  KNIGHT.  24! 

utes,  were  now  advancing  toward  the  king.  The  time 
was  short,  but  Ami  must  speak.  "  I  doubt  not,"  said  he, 
"  but  that  I  have  unduly  annoyed  my  king.  I  doubt  not 
but  that  Leo  X.,  our  Holy  Father,  is  a  scholar  and  a 
mighty  patron  of  artists,  musicians,  and  poets.  But, 
Sire,  your  kingdom  has  been  strong  in  the  love  of  your 
people.  The  next  age  —  it  seems  not  far  away  —  will 
not  be  so  favorable  to  feudatories  and  nobles,  kings  and 
popes.  We  have  seen  the  Swiss  burghers  beaten  back ; 
but  the  ideas  which  are  rife  everywhere  will  rally  the 
peoples,  even  the  peasants,  and  the  kings  will  suffer. 
The  Church  rests  in  the  power  of  the  Pope ;  it  ought  to 
rest  in  the  religious  life  of  all.  The  kingdom  rests  in  the 
greatness  of  the  king  and  in  the  subtlety  of  his  chancellor ; 
it  ought  to  rest  in  the  love  of  the  people  for  a  just 
government." 

"  Ah,  then,  you  would  have  me  abolish  the  sale  of 
judicial  offices?  " 

"  Certainly,"  replied  the  youthful  statesman.  "  It  is  an 
expediency  without  principle,  Sire.  The  parliament  of  the 
people  will  ultimately  abolish  a  parliament  of  twenty  coun- 
cillors, whose  places  were  bought  from  the  crown." 

"  We  could  not  have  had  Marignano  but  for  that  expe- 
dient of  the  Chancellor  Duprat,"  said  the  king,  curtly. 

"  Ah  !  but  what  of  the  next  Marignano?  "  Ami's  eyes 
looked  with  a  serene  unconsciousness  in  the  direction  of 
Pavia.  But  Francis  I.  had  seen  the  Pavia  of  1515  throw 
open  its  gates  with  shoutings. 

What  of  the  Pavia  of  1525?  Francis  I.  was  no 
prophet.  He  recked  not. 

Every  such  outburst  of  unimprisonable  truthfulness 
costs  the  human  soul  a  peril.  Every  act  of  moral  hero- 
ism or  of  mental  foresight  brings  a  recoil.  Ami  was 
very  young,  —  too  young,  as  it  instantly  seemed  to  him,  to 
be  lecturing  even  so  youthful  a  king,  —  too  young  as  yet 
to  have  these  notions  firmly  set  together  in  a  creed,  much. 
VOL.  i.  — 16 


242  MONK  AND   KNIGHT. 

less  in  a  political  faith.  He  had  only  come  to  that  hour 
of  political  transcendentalism  which  luxuriates  in  procla- 
mations. If  such  a  soul  keeps  his  conscience,  it  is  almost 
certain  that  he  will  come  to  be  a  most  valuable  kind  of 
utilitarian.  The  very  youth  which  was  genius,  was  ex- 
posed to  all  the  incursions  upon  imagination  and  hope  by 
the  spectacular,  which  those  faculties  of  youth  so  con- 
stantly invite  ;  and  Leo  X.  and  his  magnificence  were 
sure,  at  Ami's  age,  to  make  an  impression  overwhelming, 
if  only  fleeting,  which  only  the  meditation,  to  which  hap- 
pily he  was  addicted,  and  the  better  associations  at  the 
capital  to  which  he  was  privileged,  could  by  and  by  test, 
shatter,  or  even  obliterate. 

They  were  in  Bologna.  The  words  of  Lefevre,  whom 
Ami  had  heard  so  often,  as  he  compared  the  simplicity 
and  piety  of  Saint  Peter  with  the  luxuriousness  and  am- 
bition of  his  successor,  Leo  X.,  faded  out  of  the  mind  of 
the  imaginative  young  knight,  when  the  two  cardinal 
bishops,  who  at  an  earlier  hour  had  supported  Francis 
I.  as  he  entered  the  cathedral,  now  delicately  directed 
the  conversation  in  which  the  Holy  Father  took  such  a 
conspicuous  part,  toward  classical  themes,  and  stimulated 
his  Holiness  to  eloquent  remark  on  canon  law,  painting, 
and  music.  Ami,  with  the  chancellor  and  barons,  had 
previously  yielded  to  their  emotions  of  joy  in  tears,  as  the 
king,  whom  Bayard  had  rightly  called  "  the  handsomest 
ruler  in  the  world,"  attired  in  blue  velvet,  stood  where  the 
light  from  out  of  the  Italian  heavens  fell  upon  the  em- 
broidered fleurs-de-lis,  every  window  crowded  with  ad- 
miring faces,  every  voice  shouting,  while  cannonading 
echoed  from  the  hills.  But  now  nothing  could  tell  of  his 
limitless  delight,  as  his  sovereign,  less  magnificently 
clothed,  but  more  regal  in  manifestations  of  intellectual 
power,  pursued  the  pontiff  with  intelligent  questions  as 
to  Erasmus  of  Rotterdam,  the  restoration  of  Greek  and 


POPE,  KING,  AND  KNIGHT.  243 

Latin,  the  printed  books  of  Aldus  Manutius,  —  especially 
the  "  Plato,"  which  had  been  dedicated  to  his  Holiness,  — 
and,  above  all,  certain  manuscripts  which  awaited  recov- 
ery in  the  Orient. 

It  was  a  golden  hour  for  Ami,  for  he  had  himself 
trained  his  sovereign  on  the  very  phrases  which  caught 
the  ear  of  the  Pope,  and  the  opinions  which  fascinated 
his  attention. 

While  others  of  the  king's  attendants  were  remember- 
ing how,  but  a  few  hours  before,  his  Majesty  had  held  up 
the  train  of  the  Pope's  robe  as  he  neared  the  altar ;  or 
how,  at  a  later  moment  in  the  ceremonies,  the  supreme 
Pontiff  had  washed  and  wiped  his  hands  with  the  aid  of 
water  and  napkins  presented  by  the  king,  Ami's  joy  was 
supreme  over  the  fact  that  the  two  rulers  had  spoken 
together  of  the  Royal  College,  at  whose  head  Francis  de- 
sired to  place  the  illustrious  Erasmus,  and  the  other  fact 
that  the  Holy  Father  had  conceived  a  plan  which  had 
just  been  intrusted  to  Raphael,  which  involved  nothing 
less  than  the  reproduction  in  the  form  of  a  gigantic  model 
of  Rome  at  the  hour  of  her  grandeur.  Indeed,  the  Pope 
had  so  fascinated  the  young  knight  with  his  learning  and 
elegance,  and  so  delighted  was  Ami  that  Leonardo  da 
Vinci  had  consented  to  proceed  to  France  with  the 
return  of  the  king,  that  he  did  not  think  of  a  single  ob- 
jection to  the  alliance  into  which  Francis  I.  had  entered. 

At  length  the  interview  concluded. 

The  Pragmatic  Sanction  of  1438  was  displaced  by  a 
Concordat.  Henceforward  the  king  should  be  less  de- 
pendent upon  ecclesiastical  power  in  his  own  affairs  ;  the 
Pope,  on  the  other  hand,  became  possessed  of  the  wealth 
of  the  Church,  and  was  therefore,  in  his  own  way,  less 
dependent  upon  the  king. 

On  the  hand  of  Ami,  the  young  knight,  shone  a  gleam- 
ing emerald.  Leo  X.  had  showered  gifts  of  all  sorts  upon 
the  king's  favorites. 


244  MONK  AND  KNIGHT. 

"  It  is  for  scholarship  and  courage,"  said  the  pontiff. 

"  For  scholarship  and  courage,"  was  the  phrase  in  Ami's 
ears,  when  again  he  entered  the  palace  of  the  king,  and 
was  rejoiced  at  being  in  France  again. 

Duprat's  despotism  at  the  French  capital  was  growing 
more  pronounced.  Popular  hatred  had  begun  to  direct 
itself  against  him  and  Louise  of  Savoy.  Both  of  these 
were  irritated  beyond  measure  when  it  became  evident 
to  them  that  the  young  sovereign  had  grown  arrogant 
and  headstrong,  even  in  spite  of  the  chancellor  who  suf- 
fered most  from  the  self-sufficiency  of  the  king. 

Louise  of  Savoy,  who  never  despaired  of  controlling  her 
son,  knew  now  of  but  one  avenue  of  approach  by  which 
she  might  certainly  gain  the  king's  heart.  She  was  his 
mother,  but  she  was  anxious  to  be  his  sovereign;  and 
confidently  measuring  the  strength  and  quality  of  his 
purpose  to  extend  the  number  of  the  ladies  at  the  court 
by  adding  the  beautiful  wife  of  Jean  de  Laval  de  Mont- 
morency,  Seigneur  de  Chateaubriand,  she  resolved  to 
carry  the  scheme  to  success. 

One  night  at  Amboise  a  note  was  intrusted  to  Ami  by 
the  king,  to  be  carried  to  a  jewel-worker  and  goldsmith. 
That  note  contained  a  ring,  with  instructions  that  another 
precisely  like  it  should  be  made  at  once.  On  his  return 
to  the  castle,  Ami  was  aware  that  two  rings  were  in  the 
packet ;  and  soon  he  was  assured  that  one  of  them  had 
been  secretly  placed,  where  the  day  before  it  had  been 
found,  in  the  room  of  the  Seigneur  de  Chateaubriand. 

Faithful  to  his  king,  yet  blinded  from  the  infamous 
secret,  Ami,  a  few  days  afterward,  saw  at  court  the  beau- 
tiful Francoise  de  Foix,  now  the  wife  of  Seigneur  de 
Chateaubriand ;  and  he  overheard  a  chagrined  and  out- 
raged husband  upbraid  her  with  the  words,  — 

"  I  never  sent  the  ring.  Oh,  sweet  lamb,  in  the  cave 
of  wolves  !  I  never  sent  that  ring  to  you  !  " 


CHAPTER  XXII. 

UNRENEWED    FRANCE. 

God  will  renew  the  world,  my  dear  William  ;  and  you  will  see  it. 

Lefevre  to  Far  el,  1515. 

BEFORE  Mme.  de  Chateaubriand  had  fairly  inaugu- 
rated herself  as  the  favorite  of  Francis  I.,  even 
Louise  of  Savoy,  who  had,  as  we  have  seen,  favored  the  al- 
liance for  her  own  reasons,  was  disturbed  by  the  remarks 
which  flew  into  the  windows  of  Chambord  as  birds  of  ill 
omen.  Disdainful  as  she  was  of  the  authority  of  simple 
goodness,  the  face  of  the  wronged  husband  of  the  lovely 
Frangois  de  Foix  followed  her,  —  a  fact  which  she  might 
have  put  away  from  her  mind  had  it  not  been  that  this 
man,  who  was  now  known  as  Comte  de  Chateaubriand,  had 
in  a  moment  of  gloom  told  his  sorrows  to  certain  of  the 
men  of  the  reforming  party,  who  at  a  certain  critical  junc- 
ture had  refused  to  forsake  their  king,  although  he  had 
tried  their  loyalty  to  the  extreme.  Louise  of  Savoy  and 
Duprat  were  confident  that,  with  the  complications  which 
now  harassed  the  throne  of  Francis  I.,  he  could  not  af- 
ford to  lose  the  advice  and  labors  of  these  worthy  persons, 
who  preserved  a  warm  affection  for  their  queen  Claude, 
and  had  centred  in  their  sovereign  a  still  greater  hope  for 
a  better  system  of  domestic  government  in  France. 

"They    make    much    ado    about    morals,"    said   the 
offended  Louise    to   Duprat ;    "  and   the  worry   is    that 


246  MONK  AND  KNIGHT. 

our  daughter,  even  Marguerite,  has  given  them  her 
sympathy." 

This  was  a  double-edged  complaint  which  she  was 
fond  of  employing  to  lacerate  into  activity  the  mind  of 
the  chancellor. 

"Certain  it  is,"  said  one  of  the  reforming  party  to 
Nouvisset,  "  that  even  the  King  of  France  cannot  hold  in 
hand  the  band  of  men  who  are  attacking  the  lives  of  the 
monks,  so  long  as  our  sovereign  himself  indulges  in  royal 
iniquities.  The  Chateaubriand  affair  is  a  disgrace  to 
us  all." 

At  length  Mme.  de  Chateaubriand  herself  was  called 
upon  to  offer  any  suggestion  she  might  have  to  make  to 
the  determined  Louise,  as  to  how  this  intrigue  into  which 
Francis  I.  had  gone  heart  and  soul,  might  be  made  a 
little  more  palatable  to  the  French  public. 

"  I  have  it,"  said  she,  one  day,  as  in  the  distance  upon 
the  velvet  green  which  ran  down  by  terraces  to  the  river 
she  descried  Ami  practising  with  Francesco  at  swords,  — 
"I  have  it;  my  plan  will  work." 

"  Let  me  hear  it  at  once,"  insisted  Louise  of  Savoy,  as 
she  drew  near,  her  small,  bright  eyes  sparkling  with  a 
proud  interest  in  the  old  scheme,  of  which  this  new  one 
was  a  suddenly  extemporized  part,  calculated  to  bolster 
up  what  had  not  quite  failed,  but  seemed  tottering. 

Mme.  de  Chateaubriand's  breast  yielded  a  sigh  of  relief. 
She  was,  nevertheless,  very  nervous.  Her  beautiful  hand 
grasped  tightly  the  blossom  of  heliotrope,  which  was  soon 
entirely  crushed.  She  placed  her  elegantly  slippered  foot 
upon  the  rich  carpet  with  spirit,  and  taking  the  shameless 
mother  of  the  king  close  within  a  tapestried  corner,  out 
of  whose  shadows  gleamed  the  flames  from  her  own  hot 
cheeks,  she  said,  — 

"Ami,  the  young  knight,  who  has  troubled  you  so 
much  with  his  dreaminess  in  statecraft  and  in  morals, 
may  be  made  to  serve  us.  Every  one  of  that  brainless 


UNRENEWED  FRANCE.  247 

company  who  ape  Farel  and  Lefevre,  and  quote  Eras- 
mus, is  fond  of  Ami,  believes  in  him,  thinks  he  can  do 
nothing  improper,  certainly  nothing  wrong.  We  pur- 
chase our  indulgences  of  the  Holy  Church;  and  thus 
we  aid  the  Holy  Father  to  fight  the  Turk  or  to  finish 
St.  Peter's.  Ami,  —  why,  he  gets  his,  if  he  needs  any,  by 
flattering  the  opposition.  He  is  flesh  and  blood  like 
others ;  they  believe  he  can  do  nothing  impolitic  or 
wicked."  f. 

"Well,  what  of  that?  "  inquired  the  impatient  Louise. 

"  This,  let  me  tell  you.  Ami  is,  as  I  have  said,  hu- 
man, like  other  men.  He  has  an  affectionate  heart, 
and  —  " 

"  Yes,  I  know  he  has  a  violent  current  of  love  within 
him,  for  he  has  been  foolish  about  the  Duchesse  d'Alen- 
con,  our  Marguerite." 

"  The  offensive  pretence  !  "  hissed  the  Comtesse  de 
Chateaubriand. 

"  The  conceited  young  scoundrel ! "  added  Margue- 
rite's mother,  with  spite. 

"  As  I  was  saying,"  pursued  Mme.  de  Chateaubriand, 
"  the  man  is  very  tender  and  susceptible.  He  admires  a 
beautiful  and  intelligent  woman.  Set  a  flame  going  in 
such  a  breast  as  his,  and  it  will  communicate  itself  until 
it  burns  away  every  obstacle.  It  will  at  least  take  care  of 
itself.  He  is  bound  to  take  care  of  the  consequences." 

"  I  do  not  yet  understand  you,"  interjected  the  excited 
and  perplexed  Louise. 

"  You  shall,  gracious  madame  !  I  know,  and  so  do 
you  know,  that  if  Ami  were  in  love,  he  would  soon  find 
himself  where  he  would  have  a  new  set  of  opinions  about 
what  concerns  us." 

"  I  see,  ah,  I  see  !  "  and  the  bright,  small  eyes  of  the 
king's  mother  were  aglow  in  the  stern  face. 

"  If  Ami  were  entirely  wound  up  with  an  affair  of  the 
heart,  he  would  appreciate  the  circumstances  of  others. 


248  MONK  AND  KNIGHT. 

He  can  never  withstand  beauty  and  intellect ;  and  I  long 
for  the  day  when  he  shall  be  under  the  sway  of  love." 

"  Ah,  truly  !  "  was  the  happy  sigh  of  Louise. 

"  I  have  this  in  mind.  In  my  old  home  "  —  there  was 
something  in  the  throat  of  the  beautiful  Mme.  de  Cha- 
teaubriand when  she  said  "  home,"  something  which  she 
swallowed  with  difficulty  —  "I  left  a  sweet  and  coy 
little  companion,  a  sister  by  adoption;  and  there  is 
in  this  court  none  so  warm  or  exquisitely  lovely  in  her 
feeling  and  form  as  she.  Oh,  I  have  often  said  to  my 
heart,  when  Ami's  manliness  touched  it,  '  How  I  wish 
Astr£e  could  but  look  upon  you,  you  splendid  fellow  ! ' 
She  has  all  the  gifts  which  love  could  offer  to  the  most 
exacting  lover.  Delicious  girl  is  she  —  and  so  full  of 
light !  She  loves  books  also ;  and  if  the  blundering  priest 
to  whom  I  confessed  last,  is  not  already  making  a  mess 
out  of  her  faith  in  the  Holy  Church,  she  will  pour  through 
those  dark  eyes  of  hers  a  flood  of  radiance  upon  our 
affairs." 

"  You  mean,"  said  the  serious  Louise,  who  always  de- 
manded definiteness,  "  that  if  she  were  here,  she  is  so 
beautiful  and  so  scholarly  —  " 

"  No,  not  too  scholarly,"  interrupted  the  amiable 
favorite;  "beautiful  and  winning,  so  lovable  — " 

"That  Ami  would  surely  love  her?  How  do  you 
know  that  she  would  love  him?  "  said  the  crafty  associate 
of  Duprat. 

"  Know  it?  Who  could  help  it?  I  almost  love  Ami 
for  myself." 

"  I  think  him  a  detestable  prude,"  avowed  Louise ; 
"  but  that  has  no  significance.  Then,  let  me  under- 
stand ;  if  these  critical  moralists  of  France  who  adore 
Ami,  saw  Ami  in  love  also,  —  and  you  could  bring  that 
about,  so  that  it  would  take  the  tongue  out  of  his  mouth, 
—  if  things  went  ill  they  would  find  in  him  such  a  cham- 
pion of  the  king  and  court  as  would  silence  them.  Ah, 


UNRENEWED  FRANCE.  249 

yes  !  I  see,  I  see.  Can  you  bring  this  girl  to  our  palace  ? 
Astree,  —  did  you  say  her  name  was  Astree  ?  What  a 
beautiful  name  !  Star  of  destiny  !  Can  you  get  her  into 
our  court?  " 

"  She  will  gladly  come ;  ay,  she  longed  for  the  court 
months  ago.  If  that  confessor  —  " 

Louise  of  Savoy  heard  only  the  first  sentence  of  this 
reply,  and  was  satisfied,  nay,  delighted,  as  she  averred, 
adding,  as  she  concluded  the  interview,  — 

"  I  shall  tell  the  Duchesse  d'Alencon ;  but  she  must 
never  know  all  of  this  plan  of  ours.  I  will  tell  her  that  a 
beautiful  young  woman  is  coming,  and  that  it  is  fitter  by 
far  that  hereafter  Ami  should  be  seen  with  her  than  with 
the  king's  sister.  Our  Marguerite  must  rid  herself  of 
Ami's  confidences ;  this  will  be  her  chance." 

In  the  twilight  Francis  I.  was  walking  with  Lautrec,  the 
brother  of  Mme.  de  Chateaubriand ;  and  while  Clement 
Marot,  the  poet,  was  making  verses  for  the  favorite  of 
Francis  I.  and  his  sister  Marguerite,  they  discussed  affairs 
of  state.  Days  had  come  and  gone,  while  Parliament 
had  stood  stubbornly  eying  the  Concordat,  and  the  wily 
Duprat  was  confiding  to  the  syndics  of  the  Sorbonne  his 
purposes  as  to  the  suppression  of  the  heresies  of  Lefevre 
and  Farel,  but  especially  those  of  Louis  Berquin. 

"  The  Pope  is  an  elegant  pagan.  The  king  found  that 
out  when  he  met  him  at  Bologna.  He  cares  for  little 
save  his  music  and  manuscripts.  But  for  that  testy  and 
spoiled  Ami  —  he  was  made  a  knight  without  due  order 
or  consideration  —  the  Holy  Father  would  have  won  his 
Majesty  to  become  a  crusader  against  the  Turk.  The 
crusade  must  be  against  the  heretics  in  France,"  said 
Duprat,  as  he  left  Amboise  to  go  to  Parliament. 


CHAPTER   XXIII. 

THE   WHITE   PEAK   AMID   DARK   CLOUDS. 

"  Where  huge  Taurus,  with  his  brow 
High  heaved  above  the  clouds,  eternally 
Keeps  watch  upon  the  sun,  uplifting  thought 
Beyond  the  sensual  and  the  sublunary, 
The  darkness  and  the  storm,  and  stir  of  earth 
To  the  unchanging  peacefulness  of  heaven." 

"  T     EFEVRE  !     The  name  is  associated  with  prayer 

J *  and  confessions.  I  cannot  think  where  I  saw 

or  heard  or  dreamed  it.  Oh,  I  do  remember !  " 

The  eyelashes  of  bewitching  beauty  fell ;  the  delicate 
hands  were  lifted  to  her  cheeks ;  the  graceful  arms  held 
up  a  head  of  black,  glossy  hair ;  and  she  was  silent  until, 
with  a  self-mastering  change  of  attitude,  she  sat  more 
nearly  upright,  when  caresses  of  light  and  warmth  came 
upon  her  calm  face,  while  she  was  saying,  — 

"  I  heard  the  confessor,  to  whom  I  went  at  the  last 
with  my  heartbreak  at  leaving  home,  —  I  heard  him 
speak  the  name  Lefevre.  He  called  him  '  beloved,'  and 
he  told  me  to  listen  to  Lefevre's  wisdom.  But  the  sor- 
rows of  departing  from  my  home  overthrew  the  recol- 
lection, and  I  have  heard  no  one  at  this  court  speak 
of  him  until  this  moment." 

"  No,  they  are  not  likely  to  talk  much  of  such  a  fear- 
less saint  as  he.  He  is  too  likely  to  trouble  them  about 


THE    WHITE    PEAK  AMID  DARK  CLOUDS,      251 

the  matter  of  duties,  morals,  and  the  like,"  said  the 
young  man,  who  sat  with  her  under  the  reddened  trellis 
at  the  end  of  a  long  vista  of  olives,  whose  verdure  did 
not  entirely  hide  a  marvellous  perspective,  into  which 
they  both  were  gazing  with  dreaming  eyes. 

They  were  Ami  and  Astree,  —  together  alone  for  the 
first  time.  Only  two  months  had  passed  since  Louise  of 
Savoy  and  Mme.  de  Chateaubriand  had  hit  upon  a  scheme 
for  hiding  a  questionable  affection -beneath  the  attach- 
ment which  each  was  sure  would  spring  up  between 
these  souls.  And  now  Francis  I.,  who  more  than  ever 
had  need  to  desire  it,  was  congratulating  the  royal  favor- 
ite, as  they  sipped  their  wine,  that  things  were  going 
well. 

Alone  together,  after  what  an  experience  of  agony  and 
distrust !  What  wonder  was  it  that  as  soon  as  possible 
Ami  had  hurried  their  talk  to  Lefevre,  saint  and  hero  ! 
What  marvel  that  as  soon  as  Astree  recalled  associations 
of  faith  and  purity  in  its  connection,  she  felt  it  to  be  a 
tower  of  defence ;  and  she  lifted  her  womanly  eyes  to 
find  benedictions  in  the  eyes  of  him  who  had  spoken  it. 

A  fortnight  before,  Astree,  duly  attended,  had  arrived 
in  the  capital,  and  had  at  once  been  made  a  welcome 
guest  at  the  palace.  *  Soon  she  was  persuaded  to  become 
one  of  the  court  of  the  Queen  Claude.  AstreVs  memory 
of  the  woman  known  at  court  as  Mme.  de  Chateaubriand 
was  not  so  pleasant  as  it  would  have  been  had  the  latter 
never  reminded  Astree,  in  those  other  days  when  her 
charms  seemed  annoying,  that  she  was  only  an  adopted 
member  of  the  household.  Indeed,  Astree  was  as  en- 
tirely surprised  at  the  graceful  recognition  given  to  her 
now  by  the  comtesse,  as  she  had  been  by  the  affectionate 
message  which  the  former  had  answered  by  appearing  at 
court.  Little  did  Astree  dream  of  the  terrible  exigency 
which  had  made  such  a  letter  easy  for  the  comtesse  to 
write  ! 


252  MONK  AND  KNIGHT. 

Something  distasteful  the  solitary  and  thoughtful  girl 
knew  was  in  the  air  of  the  court  before  she  had  breathed 
it  for  a  day.  The  Comte  de  Chateaubriand,  —  where 
was  he  at  moments  when  the  luxuriant  beauty  of  his  wife 
exhaled  its  fragrant  balm  in  the  presence  of  the  king? 
Queen  Claude,  —  where  was  she  in  the  hours  in  which 
Astree  found  herself  with  the  young  knight  Ami,  accom- 
panied, as  they  had  been,  under  the  pale  lilacs  and  across 
the  soft  lawns  by  the  sovereign  and  the  comtesse  ? 

These  queries  came  up  to  her  thought  like  ragged 
rocks  out  of  the  midst  of  a  magical  lake,  breaking  up  and 
distorting  the  beautiful  sheen.  They  grew  still  more 
threatening  when  Astree  recalled  to  mind  the  words  of 
the  confessor  at  home,  who  she  noticed  hardly  listened 
to  the  words  she  spoke  to  him,  so  pure  and  true  did  he 
believe  her  to  be ;  who  however,  instead,  told  her  with 
loving  seriousness  of  the  evils  of  the  world  and  the 
temptations  of  the  French  capital. 

"  Would  that  his  Majesty  were  a  more  serious  man  !  " 
he  had  said  sadly  to  Astree,  as  he  bade  her  farewell. 

Still  more  had  Astree 's  nervousness  increased,  when 
she  was  gravely  told  by  the  Comtesse  de  Chateaubriand 
that  she  must  take  the  world  much  as  she  found  it ;  that 
she  could  not  be  her  adviser  in  many  things,  owing  to 
her  relations  to  the  court,  and  that  she  knew  of  no  one 
who  would  be  so  likely  to  befriend  her  as  the  young 
knight  Ami. 

What  could  Astree  do  in  such  a  moment  as  she  was 
sure  must  come? 

That  night  the  soft  coverings  which  hid  the  costly 
woods  from  which  the  rich  furnishings  of  Astree's  room 
had  been  made,  were  torn  away,  and  everything  was  as 
ugly  and  hard  as  iron.  The  brilliant  candelabra  grew 
dull ;  and  she  even  condemned  the  nightingale  for  his 
presence  without,  when  his  song  floated  through  the 
cypress-trees  and  vineyards  into  her  window,  bringing  with 


THE    WHITE  PEAK  AMID  DARK  CLOUDS.      2$$ 

it  fresh  fragrances  and  a  thousand  excuses  for  the  hot 
tears  which  gushed  forth  as  she  threw  back  the  cloud  of 
black  hair  about  her  and  cried  for  home. 

"  Something  about  this  gorgeous  place  is  so  false,  so 
false  !  I  seem  to  be  stepping  nearer  to  a  plank  which 
will  give  way,  or  about  to  gather  a  flower  which  will 
poison  me.  Everything  seems  false,  —  everything?  "  and 
she  looked  out  into  the  moonlight,  which  wove  a  splendor 
around  her  form,  as  it  panted  sleeplessly  upon  the  furs 
which  had  been  thrown  over  her  couch.  "  Everything 
seems  false  here  —  except  the  knight  Ami." 

Astre"e  had  said  it  at  last,  and  with  the  saying  of  it  there 
came  a  reflection  that  something  solid  remained  to  her 
in  this  transforming  life  ;  and  with  that  reflection  she  went 
to  sleep,  to  wake  in  the  morning  half  ashamed,  yet  not 
altogether  troubled,  because  she  had  gone  to  sleep  the 
night  before,  her  lips  moving  with  the  name  of  a  young 
knight  whom  she  had  seen  but  for  a  day. 

That  one  day,  however,  was  invested  with  many  of  the 
profoundest  meanings  of  eternity.  It  lay  in  the  souls  of 
both  Ami  and  Astree  like  an  awful  cloud-bank  over  a 
parched  desert.  Lightnings  and  thunders  might  be 
hidden  within  it ;  perhaps  only  sweet  rains.  It  was  a 
dreadful  menace  of  doom,  or  it  was  the  very  breast  of 
the  Infinite  Love.  Neither  knew  which  of  these  that  day 
would  turn  out  to  be ;  both  of  them  had  looked  back  to 
it,  however,  and  confessed  its  resistless  charm. 

Louise  of  Savoy,  Mme.  de  Chateaubriand,  Francis  I., 
perhaps  even  the  Duchesse  d'Alencon,  who  now  under- 
stood the  design  of  the  three,  could  have  saved  these 
two  souls  the  scorching  fire  which  at  first  breathed  indig- 
nation and  then  revenge,  —  a  fire  which  they  put  within 
hours  otherwise  sure  to  have  been  the  gladdest  hours 
of  their  lives.  But  they  could  not  have  saved  these  in- 
nocent souls  and  yet  have  operated  their  plan.  A  base 
love,  by  whomsoever  abetted,  is  cruel  above  all  things. 


254  MONK  AND  KNIGHT. 

No  complete  chronicle  can  be  made  of  that  day,  be- 
cause no  record  can  be  made  of  such  a  thrill  of  joy  as 
Ami  felt  when  he  saw  this  modest  and  yet  surprisingly 
beautiful  young  woman  outshine  the  exquisite  Margue- 
rite, whose  intellectual  hospitality  had  invited  her  to  the 
largest  liberty,  in  talking  of  the  men  of  the  reform  and 
the  poet  Clement  Marot.  Ami  had  not  been  present 
at  the  first,  when  the  conversation  began,  and  so  found 
himself  at  once  in  the  presence  of  a  creature  of  such 
brightness  and  dash,  at  once  so  modest  and  so  skilful, 
that  he  forgot  to  notice  the  loveliness  which  enwrapped 
her  as  she  spoke.  He  had,  however,  noticed  the  look  of 
utter  disconsolateness  which  overspread  the  sallow  feat- 
ures of  the  king's  mother  as  this  engaging  woman,  whom 
he  now  knew  as  a  guest  of  the  queen,  —  who  was  always 
unaccountably  absent,  —  sat  pronouncing  the  names  of 
those  men  in  France  whose  influence  Duprat  was  vainly 
seeking  to  abolish.  Even  the  Comtesse  de  Chateau- 
briand did  not  quite  excel,  as  usual,  in  piquancy  and  de- 
lightful remark,  as  she  searched  for  the  glances  of  the 
king. 

Soon,  however,  the  gracious  Duchesse  d'Alencon  had 
allowed  Ami  and  Astree  the  privilege  of  the  balcony 
upon  which  they  had  been  sitting,  from  which  the  other 
members  of  the  royal  party  had  retired.  In  the  glad 
recognition  which  the  knight  made  of  such  charms,  asso- 
ciated with  a  more  than  womanly  regard  for  literature  and 
reformers,  he  was  unaware  of  his  being  alone  with  her. 
Even  when  the  pale  shadows  became  longer,  he  was 
utterly  unconscious  of  any  stranger  feeling  than  that  of 
having  met  a  most  lovely  woman  with  whom  he  seemed 
always  on  the  point  of  being  at  ease,  with  whom  he 
constantly  found  himself  in  painful  embarrassment. 

Oh,  if  he  could  have  known  that  she  also  was  sure  that 
a  poison  hung  in  the  air,  he  had  grasped  her  and  borne 
her  away  ! 


THE    WHITE   PEAK  AMID  DAPK  CLOUDS-      2$$ 

There  appeared  to  be  enough  within  sight  to  talk  about, 
but  the  air  was  unpropitious.  A  brother  of  hers  he  had 
seen  dying,  —  dead,  at  Marignano.  Her  tears  would  have 
been  jewels  upon  her  womanhood  had  not  a  foul  breath, 
which  somehow  stole  in  from  some  unseen  corner,  dried 
them  upon  her  eyes,  while  they  tried  to  talk.  That 
awful  silence  which  thrusts  itself  in  like  a  sword  when 
young  souls  are  innocently  feeling  for  one  another  in  the 
darkness  and  yet  are  not  alone,  came  between  them ; 
and  the  light  which  came  again  to  their  faces,  as  they 
found  another  agreeable  topic,  was  hot  like  the  breath  of 
a  sirocco.  Each  was  sure,  at  length,  that  an  awful  doubt 
possessed  the  other ;  and  in  such  an  air  the  pain  of  de- 
parture is  keener  than  that  which  comes  with  remaining 
and  with  bearing  it  all  bravely.  Something  so  mechani- 
cal haunted  them,  as  they  still  sat  alone. 

In  the  limpid  light  which  fell  upon  her  slender  arm 
and  white  shoulders,  and  through  the  persuasive  airs 
which  came  through  the  myrtle  and  cypress  trees  to  play 
about  his  fine  features,  there  was  a  hard,  predetermined 
something  which  each  felt,  as  if  each  heard  a  creaking 
of  wheels.  A  mighty  respect  each  was  finding  for  the 
other,  —  and  more,  it  was  accompanied  with  sensations 
more  tender  by  far ;  but  neither  could  fail  to  feel  a  grow- 
ing rage  at  what  made  further  speech  impossible. 

How  they  parted  that  night  neither  knew.  Only  a 
vague  memory  remained.  Astre"e  had  gone  to  sleep  with 
his  name  upon  her  lips.  Ami  had  tossed  himself  into 
a  dream,  in  which  were  delirious  words  of  affection, 
even  languorous  caresses  and  rushes  of  blood  to  his 
face,  which  woke  him.  Then  he  slept  again,  —  the 
bright,  small  eyes  of  Louise  of  Savoy  and  the  faces  of 
the  king  and  the  comtesse  looking  down  upon  his 
dream  of  love. 

The  days  which  lay  between  that  hour  and  this  in 
which  we  have  found  them  talking  of  Lefevre  the  Re- 


256  MONK  AND  KNIGHT. 

former,  had  been  days  of  revelation.  Ami  had  found 
out  for  himself  the  wicked  plot  which  contemplated  the 
disgrace  of  both  Astre"  e  and  himself ;  and  now  he  saw,  or 
thought  he  saw,  within  the  hateful  gloom  a  soul  to  whom 
he  was  bound  in  the  holy  secret  of  knightly  love. 

The  reddening  leaves  upon  the  trellis  were  shaking 
with  the  song  which  came  swelling  forth  from  the  tiny 
throat  which  yonder  in  the  nodding  pine  was  bursting 
with  melody;  and  much  as  Ami  loved  the  name  of 
Lefevre,  his  soul  was  a  tremble  with  a  name  which 
he  had  just  accustomed  his  lips  to  pronounce  alone,  — 
As  free  ! 

As  she  went  on  to  tell  him  what  the  confessor  —  who, 
as  the  comtesse  feared,  had  planted  the  seeds  of  the 
Reformation  within  Astre"  e  —  had  said  to  her  about  Le- 
fevre, her  face  became  animated  and  her  lips  dropped  sen- 
tences which  to  Ami  were  far  more  eloquent  than  those 
of  the  Ciceronians  themselves.  Not,  however,  until  she 
began,  in  a  tone  half  confessing  to  him,  half  reassuring  to 
herself,  to  tell  him  of  the  fears  with  which  she  had  set  out 
toward  the  capital,  did  her  voice  seize  his  very  heart.  It 
was  so  piteous  and  so  true  that  the  true  knight  was 
roused. 

"The  Comtesse  de  Chateaubriand  said  that  I  could 
trust  my  questions  and  fears  to  you ;  and  yet  I  fear  that 
this  is  not  right." 

Ami  saw  the  lips  labor  and  the  eyes  grow  misty  as  she 
hesitated ;  and  then,  like  a  white  lightning-streak  from 
a  black  cloud,  there  came  the  words  :  "  The  damnation 
they  meant  shall  fail,  except  to  them  !  " 

"  I  am  afraid  !  "  she  cried  softly,  and  looked  as  if  she 
would  have  crept  somewhere  for  safety. 

"  Not  of  me,  I  beg  you  !  "  and  the  stalwart  knight  rose 
to  his  full  height,  looking  as  tenderly  as  he  did  truly 
into  her  very  soul. 

"  No ;  not  of  you  !    But  I  wish  I  dare  feel  that  no 


THE    WHITE  PEAK  AMID  DARK  CLOUDS.      257 

harm  was    intended.      The    comtesse   asks    me   strange 
questions." 

Ami  thought  how  the  king  had  asked  him  of  his  opin- 
ion of  the  "star;  "  and  for  the  first  time,  for  a  moment, 
the  knight  hated  the  king. 

He  understood  it  all  now.  Within  the  heat  of  his 
knightly  ire  his  eye  grew  prophetic.  He  could  see  within 
this  woman  a  future  dear  beyond  all  else  to  him.  As 
she  went  on  to  tell  him  of  her  sorrow  at  finding  the  court 
so  debased,  the  negligence  visited  on  the  queen,  the  ab- 
sence of  the  Comte  de  Chateaubriand,  the  treatment  of 
Bourbon,  Ami  saw  how  surely  within  that  incomparable 
beauty  of  form  and  face  dwelt  a  soul  whose  spiritual  life 
would  make  this  loveliness  its  throne.  Without  a  spirit- 
ual life  she  seemed  too  lovely,  too  fascinating. 

"  Only  an  adopted  sister,"  said  he  to  his  heart,  as  never 
the  Comtesse  de  Chateaubriand  had  said  it  to  hers. 
"  Yes ;  she  has  something  which  the  comtesse  never  had. 
A  saint  may  be  even  as  beautiful." 

Ami  saw  in  Astre"e  —  for  he  was  far  from  being  insen- 
sible to  her  physical  charms  —  that  exquisite  profile  so 
instinct  with  warm  sentiment,  and  that  honest  beautiful- 
ness  of  eye  which  illuminated  his  conscience.  It  was 
as  different  from  the  dull  lassitude  in  the  eyes  about  the 
court,  as  is  the  free,  stimulating  scent  of  a  rose  from  the 
sickly  odor  which  often  infects  the  hot  air. 

On  and  on  she  talked,  with  innocent  grace,  answering 
Ami's  questions,  proposing  others,  until  each  saw  that 
they  had  escaped  the  prepared  meshes. 

"You  are  terrified  with  the  -prospect  of  being  en- 
slaved here.  Are  you  willing  to  trust  your  whole  self  to 
any  one?"  he  ventured. 

She  looked  out  into  the  sky. 

"  How  different  it  all  is  from  the  indolent  voluptuous- 
ness of  this  court !  "   he  thought,  as  she  seemed  to  be 
searching  for  God. 
VOL.  i.  — 17 


258  MONK  AND  KNIGHT. 

The  sky  was  like  a  green,  dreamy  sea.  Swallows 
twittered  about  the  red  leaves,  some  of  which  were 
falling  through  the  sighing  warmth  of  the  late  summer. 
Nature  everywhere  was  taking  a  long,  deep,  languid 
breath,  from  the  Infinite  Love.  The  vista,  edged  with 
foliage,  was  becoming  a  blurred  memory,  as  he  lis- 
tened for  her  voice  which  had  vibrated  in  such  tender- 
ness. He  knew  she  was  as  simple  as  a  child,  and  that 
she  knew  not  what  had  led  her  to  him  amid  all  this 
cursed  doubt. 

Why  should  he  stand  and  burn  with  such  a  hope  which 
might  be  such  a  rapture  ?  She  had  not  understood  him, 
he  was  sure.  "  She  wonders  if,  after  all,  any  man  here 
is  trustworthy,"  divined  Ami. 

Ah,  Ami !  she  has  understood.  Yes ;  she  only  won- 
ders if,  after  all,  any  man  here  is  worthy  of  trust.  She 
is  trying  to  escape  the  cynicalness  which  Comtesse  de 
Chateaubriand's  experiences  have  just  been  teaching 
her,  despite  the  compliments  that  lady  has  lavished  on 
you  ! 

"You  are  not  willing  to  be  enslaved?"  faltered  the 
knight,  never  so  certain  of  how  weak  he  was. 

"  I  am  willing  to  be  enslaved  in  your  love,  in  order 
that  I  may  be  /ree,"  she  said ;  and  at  once  the  slender 
hands  clasped  his,  as  they  stood  close  together  under 
the  reddening  leaves. 

"  Astre"e  !  "  said  he,  his  lips  still  warm  with  the  glow  of 
her  own,  "  I  remember  that  once,  when  I  was  a  little 
child,  away,  far  away  from  this  place,  I  saw  the  damp 
and  chill  clouds  gather  about  the  little  hills  and  hide 
them.  My  father  —  poor  man  !  he  was  cruelly  slain  — 
carried  me,  led  me,  then  carried  me  again,  up  and  on, 
until  we  two  looked  down  on  it  all,  —  the  whole  cloud- 
covered  realm.  Then  we  saw  a  white  peak,  like  silver 
for  gleaming  purity,  rising  out  of  the  dark  mist.  It  had 
passed  out  of  my  mind  until  just  now." 


THE    WHITE  PEAK  AMID  DARK  CLOUDS.      259 

"  Mayhap,"  lisped  the  joyous  Astree,  as  she  stopped 
again  with  him  under  the  white  poplars  and  looked 
proudly  upon  the  pure  lines  in  his  face,  —  "  mayhap  our 
Father,  God,  has  led  us  both  above  the  sordid  mists 
which  were  sent  to  envelop  us ;  and  we  now  behold  com- 
ing up  out  of  all  that  murkiness  a  love  as  pure  as  it  is 
true." 

They  hesitated,  each  soul  drinking  in  the  new  luxury 
of  plighted  love ;  and  Ami  seemeo^  to  have  sipped  elo- 
quence from  lips  which  knew  not  their  own  secret  power, 
as  he  said  :  "  Astree  !  my  darling  Astr£e  !  I  ought  not 
to  have  waited.  I  was  afraid  of  you.  Oh,  you  sweet 
one,  you  seemed  too  beautiful !  The  very  flavor  of  your 
loveliness  is  now  my  soul's  hope.  You  have  dreamy 
eyes,  my  own  !  But  I  shall  keep  the  one  great  dream 
there  —  " 

Both  of  the  lovers  were  startled,  and  instantly  they 
were  in  hiding. 

They  saw  the  King  of  France  and  Mme.  de  Chateau- 
briand coming.  Astree  crept  so  close  to  Ami,  as  these 
passed  by,  that  she  could  feel  the  throb  of  Ami's  heart. 
Each  shuddered  at  the  abandon  of  the  comtesse.  The 
wind,  which  had  just  sprung  up,  had  a  voice  of  pity  as  it 
wailed  through  the  larches  and  lifted  the  long  black  hair 
of  the  king.  His  eyes  were  languorous,  as  they  sought 
to  mark  the  decline  of  the  sun  which  still  empurpled  the 
grass.  Each  was  silent. 

A  moment  before,  under  the  acacias,  the  shivering 
sovereign  had  said  to  his  favorite :  "  It  has  all  gone 
wrong  for  us,  all  right  for  them.  Ami  loves  Astree 
deeply  and  honorably.  She  also  is  bound  to  him  in 
the  purest  affection.  Our  affair  cannot  hide  behind 
them.  We  must  never  break  two  such  hearts.  Ours 
must  throw  no  shadow  over  their  rapturous  love. 
They  will  come  back  to  the  palace  to-night  —  believe 
me! — betrothed."  .* 


260 


MONK  AND  KNIGHT. 


"  Rid  your  Majesty's  self  of  him  ! "  she  had  replied 
half  in  anger. 

"  I  cannot !  I  cannot,  if  I  will,"  said  the  French 
King.  "  The  astrologer  said  it.  Ah,  sweet  love  !  the  as- 
trologer told  me ;  and  Marignano  proved  the  astrologer 
to  be  a  seer." 


CHAPTER  XXIV. 

EASTER   AT    GLASTONBURY. 

The  chains  which  cramp  us  most  are  those  which  weigh  on  us  least. 

MME.  SWETCHINE. 

ON  the  day  upon  which  Francis  I.,  after  incredible 
hardships,  had  reached  the  plains  of  Saluzzo,  Pope 
Leo  X.  made  Thomas  Wolsey  cardinal ;  and  at  the  very 
moment  upon  which  Ami,  the  French  knight,  on  the  way 
to  Bologna  was  annoying  his  sovereign  with  what  is  yet 
called  theoretical  politics,  Vian,  the  English  monk,  was 
attending  the  Abbot  of  Glastonbury,  as  he  assisted  the 
Abbot  of  Westminster  in  carrying  the  red  hat  to  the 
high  altar.  Unimpressed  with  the  din  of  bells  and  voices 
which  made  all  London  tremble,  unmoved  by  the  mag- 
nificence of  Wolsey  and  the  Te  Deum  which  had  just 
ceased  to  sound  in  his  ears,  Vian  was  beyond  meas- 
ure delighted  to  reflect  that  the  sermon  was  preached 
by  no  less  a  representative  of  "  the  new  learning  "  than 
Dr.  John  Colet,  Dean  of  St.  Paul's. 

For  the  best  of  reasons  this  wearied  young  man  felt 
himself  enthralled  at  once  with  admiration  for  the  newly 
made  cardinal  Wolsey,  who  had  doubtless  selected  the 
preacher. 

'*  Could  his  Holiness  Leo  X.  have  known  that  the  man 
whom,  with  Erasmus  and  Sir  Thomas  More,  the  Abbot 
of  Glastonbury  had  distrusted  as  heretical  almost  beyond 


262  MONK  AND  KNIGHT. 

toleration,  was  to  preach  this  sermon?"  thought  Vian, 
as  they  walked  through  the  western  door  toward  the 
banquet-hall. 

"  Leo  X.  is  only  a  delightful  pagan  in  the  position  of  a 
great  Christian."  These  words  of  Fra  Giovanni,  which 
had  been  spoken  to  his  uneasy  innocence  at  Glastonbury, 
often  came  back  to  Vian,  when  in  later  days  he  had  to 
know  more  of  both  Pope  and  Cardinal. 

Before  the  days  of  rejoicing  at  London  were  concluded, 
Vian  was  made  aware  that  the  good  Abbot  Richard 
Beere  himself  had  less  antipathy  to  "the  new  learning  " 
than  had  manifested  itself  on  previous  occasions.  Per- 
haps a  long  conversation  which  that  spiritual  dignitary 
held  with  the  new  cardinal  reconciled  him  in  some 
greater  measure  to  the  schemes  of  the  scholars,  as  it 
certainly  did  render  Richard  Beere  in  various  ways  an 
earnest  supporter  of  the  prelate,  who  at  that  hour  could 
be  reached  only  by  passing  through  many  tapestried 
rooms,  and  who,  attired  as  he  was  in  a  violet-colored 
rochet  half  covered  with  a  tippet  of  sable,  was  surrounded 
by  gentlemen  in  crimson  velvet  overhung  with  chains 
of  gold,  while  he  amused  himself  with  statecraft,  costly 
portraiture,  or  exquisite  music. 

"  Ah  !  "  said  Abbot  Richard,  "  my  son  Vian,  I  like 
the  new  cardinal.  He  —  the  saints  forefend  it !  —  but  he 
will  at  some  time  demand  you  from  Glastonbury.  I  have 
oftentimes  been  harsh  in  my  words  with  the  men  of  '  the 
new  learning.'  Even  yet  I  must  keep  heresy  out  of  my 
abbey,  though  Master  Colet  speaks  eloquently." 

Vian  saw,  or  thought  he  saw,  many  things  within  these 
nebulous  remarks. 

Had  the  sub-prior  and  Ammonius  at  Cambridge  really 
dreamed  of  getting  him  into  Wolsey's  service,  because 
the  abbot  had  given  up  making  out  of  him  a  good 
ecclesiastic  ? 

Was  the   Lord  Abbot  of  Glastonbury  at  last  so  con- 


EASTER  AT  GLASTONBURY.  263 

vinced  that  the  men  of  "  the  new  learning  "  meant  well 
and  did  wisely  for  England  and  the  Church,  that  he  en- 
joyed John  Colet? 

Any  answer  to  either  of  these  questions  meant  much  to 
our  thoughtful  and  unquiet  monk. 

It  is  true  that  Vian  and  the  box  which  he  and  the  sub- 
prior  brought  back  with  them  from  Lutterworth  to  Glas- 
tonbury  had  done  much  in  that  sacred  shrine  of  Catholic 
orthodoxy  to  foster  a  desire  in  the  soul  of  its  revered 
head  for  some  sort  of  relief.  Not  a"  day  had  passed  after 
Vian's  return  until  Fra  Giovanni,  who  had  used  his  accus- 
tomed whip  upon  the  abbot  to  obtain  the  office,  had 
become  sole  custodian  of  the  Aldines  and  the  Wycliffe 
letters.  That  signified  trouble  to  Richard  Beere.  He 
was  aware  that  something  either  unduly  salacious  or  very 
unorthodox  —  at  all  events,  something  revolutionary  of  his 
pious  plans  —  had  come  into  the  abbey  in  such  a  way  as 
to  threaten  no  end  of  discomfort.  But  he  was  powerless. 
He  could  humiliate  the  Duke  of  Suffolk,  but  he  could 
not  deny  Fra  Giovanni. 

Easter  Sunday,  1517,  found  Vian,  whose  talent  for 
music  and  whose  excellent  voice  had  made  him  promi- 
nent in  all  that  related  to  the  festival  ceremonies,  weary 
with  the  exercises  of  the  seven  days  preceding. 

"Ah!"  said  the  wheezing  Giovanni,  whom  nothing 
but  a  very  severe  attack  of  asthma  could  entirely  silence, 
"it  is  well  for  your  voice  that  pious  souls  have  com- 
manded stillness  in  the  cloisters  for  three  days.  The 
dumb  saints  are  the  holier,  at  all  events." 

"  It  is  not  what  cometh  into  a  man,"  said  Vian,  "  but 
what  goeth  out,  that  defileth." 

"  True,"  gasped  the  Italian.  "  Since  you  came  from 
Lutterworth,  a  good  deal  of  heresy  has  been  going  into 
the  brethren  here.  It  would  ruin  Glastonbury  to  have 
it  all  come  out.  Those  letters  of  that  brazen  heretic 
John  Wycliffe  have  been  half  worn  out  by  the  monks, 


264  MONK  AND  KNIGHT. 

who  often  have  not  time  to  stuff  them  beneath  their 
stoles  carefully,  when  they  hear  Abbot  Richard's  foot- 
steps or  my  orthodox  wheezing.  Vian,  nothing  has  done 
so  much  for  the  holy  faith  in  Glastonbury  for  an  hundred 
years,  save  the  blooming  thorn  and  my  bundle  of  birchen 
rods,  as  has  my  whistling  windpipe.  I  have  seen  many 
a  brother  put  heresy  under  his  foot,  —  that  is,  I  have 
beheld  him  stuff  one  of  those  letters  of  John  Wycliffe  in 
his  shoe  when  I  came  within  hearing.  It  is  a  great  gain 
for  orthodoxy,  that  after  the  bell-ringing  these  half-grown 
saints  of  ours  have  to  unshoe  themselves  and  walk  bare- 
foot in  the  procession.  John  Wycliffe  had  never  so 
many  pious  walks,  as  he  has  had  since  you  brought  him 
to  Richard  Beere's  abbey.  Did  you  find  your  tongue 
before  Tierce?" 

Vian  knew  that  the  sly  old  Giovanni  referred  to  the 
scene  of  Monday  before  entering  chapter.  It  was  the 
annual  book-gathering.  He  himself  had  been  frightened 
nearly  out  of  his  wits,  for  fear  of  losing  some  of  the  pre- 
cious books;  and  he  had  been  amused  almost  beyond 
expression  at  monks  who  were  getting  their  souls  ready 
for  the  prostrate  psalms. 

The  keeper  of  the  library  had  laid  out  upon  the  carpet 
in  the  chapter  every  book,  as  the  abbot  supposed, 
which  helped  to  constitute  the  limited  but  priceless  col- 
lection from  which  the  monks  could  borrow.  Every 
borrower  brought  with  him  the  book  which  had  been 
loaned  to  him.  The  sentence  of  the  Benedictine  rule  was 
solemnly  read.  Giovanni's  eyes  twinkled  with  humor 
as  the  sermon  proceeded,  which  was  clearly  directed 
against  the  reading  of  such  books  as  might  offend  piety 
or  uproot  the  faith.  The  old  man  wheezed  so  immod- 
erately when  the  keeper  read  the  list  of  books  loaned  to 
the  various  monks,  that  each  monk  was  reminded  of  the 
many  times  in  the  course  of  the  year  on  which  the 
asthma  of  the  Italian  had  suddenly  precluded  him  from 


EASTER  AT  GLASTONBURY.  26$ 

enjoying  a  stolen  literary  feast  with  one  of  Vian's  "  Lutter- 
worth  Collection,"  as  they  had  named  it. 

"  It  was  amazing  to  see  how  many  of  the  brethren  who 
had  not  read  the  books  which  they  had  borrowed  had  to 
ask  for  pardon,"  remarked  Vian,  complacently,  as  he 
afterward  spoke  of  the  day. 

"  Every  one  of  them,"  laughed  Giovanni,  "  had  read 
one  of  the  Wycliffe  letters ;  and  some  had  read  t  Piers 
Plowman '  and  the  '  Praise  of  Folly '  twice.  I  had  to 
flog  the  abbot  himself  last  year,  for  laughing  at  the  story 
of  the  Mendicant  friars.  I  caught  him  reading  it  on  the 
day  of  the  Feast  of  the  She-Ass.  Abbot  Richard  was  not 
thinking  about  his  Lord  riding  that  blameless  animal, 
when  I  entered  and  saw  him  quite  excited.  He  in- 
stantly dropped  the  book  and  lifting  his  eyes  to  heaven, 
and  looking  as  if  the  ass  were  speaking,  as  you  know  the 
animal  does  in  the  procession  when  Balaam  spurs  her 
on,  he  said,  "Why  do  you  hurt  me  so  with  your  spurs?  " 

Vian  could  not  repress  his  merriment  at  this ;  but 
Giovanni  continued  :  "  I  said,  '  My  Lord  Abbot,  /  am 
not  Balaam  spurring  you ;  but,  for  all  I  know,  you  may 
be  the  other  — '  whereat,  rallying  from  the  first  bewilder- 
ment into  which  I  had  plunged  him,  he  became  furious 
with  holy  rage  at  me." 

"  What !  "  said  Vian  ;  "  Giovanni,  did  you  flog  him?  " 

"  That  I  did ;  why  not  ?  ' '  cried  the  old  hypocrite,  as 
he  choked  with  laughter.  "  I  shall  not  allow  the  Abbot 
of  Glastonbury  to  read  such  pernicious  books  on  such 
holy  days,  whatever  the  rest  of  you  do.  I  must  keep 
the  head  of  this  sacred  institution  from  the  perils  of 
heresy." 

Vian's  services  to  the  Lord  Abbot  Richard  on  that 
Easter  Sunday  were  most  hearty  and  numerous.  He  was 
in  an  unsettled  state  of  mind.  He  even  hoped  that  this 
would  prove  to  be  his  last  Easter  in  Glastonbury ;  and 
much  as  he  loved  the  holy  shrine,  all  the  world  without 


266  MONK  AND  KNIGHT. 

was  calling  him  with  a  voice  which  he  had  never  heard 
before. 

In  the  procession  to  the  crucifix  after  Lauds,  he  walked 
with  solemn  worshipfulness,  thinking  of  the  changes 
which  had  come  and  gone,  and  the  unchanged  power  of 
his  Redeemer's  cross.  Reason  in  so  young  a  man  has 
its  struggle  with  imagination,  within  the  eye  and  ear, 
because  through  them  come  the  strongest  appeals  to  this 
picture- making  and  picture-discerning  faculty.  One 
seems  to  have  been  so  sure  of  one's  faith,  which  was 
really  the  faith  or  perhaps  only  the  belief  of  some  one 
else,  that  when  to  the  tossed  soul,  by  some  repeated 
scene,  the  era  of  unquestioning  acquiescence  is  brought 
back,  there  is  usually  a  disposition  to  leave  the  uneasy 
task  of  thought  for  the  balmy  passiveness  of  memory. 

So  Vian  felt,  especially  as  they  proceeded  to  perform 
the  office  of  the  sepulchre. 

He  was  still  attired  in  his  fringed  cope  and  the  other 
garments  constituting  the  robe  of  a  singer.  His  hood 
was  hanging  nearly  to  his  feet ;  and  the  graceful  form  of 
the  young  monk  was  half  discovering  itself  beneath  the 
folds  which  fell  about  him,  as  he  looked  upon  the  three 
deacons  who  were  clothed  to  represent  the  three  Marys, 
who  now  were  advancing  through  the  middle  of  the 
choir  and  were  saying  with  pathos,  as  they  neared  the 
sepulchre,  "  Who  will  roll  away  for  us  the  stone  at 
the  door  of  the  sepulchre?" 

As,  suddenly,  a  beautiful  lad  with  angelic  look  and 
dress  appeared,  and  the  golden  wheat-ear  which  he  held 
was  showing  richly  against  his  stainless  alb,  Vian  remem- 
bered that  this  was  his  own  place  years  before,  and  that 
now  instead  he  was  a  struggling  doubter,  looking  upon 
much  within  the  abbey  as  superstitious,  and  sure  to  look 
upon  this  story  of  the  resurrection  of  Christ  as  a  fable 
also,  if  he  could  not  find  some  securer  resting-place  than 
either  Rome  or  Reason. 


EASTER  AT  GLASTONBURY.  267 

"  Whom  do  you  seek  in  the  grave?  "  lisped  the  voice, 
which  was  full  of  the  celestial  music  of  innocent 
childhood. 

"Jesus  of  Nazareth,  who  was  crucified,"  was  the  an- 
swer of  the  three,  each  of  whom  still  held  a  vase  before 
him. 

The  finger  of  the  white-robed  boy  pointed  to  the 
sepulchre  ;  and  his  unshaken  voice  said,  "  He  is  not 
here ;  he  is  risen."  The  angel  had  departed  with  the 
echo  of  these  words. 

Two  priests  —  each  of  whom  Vian  knew  to  be  far  from 
angelic  in  his  behavior  —  now  spoke  from  the  places 
without  the  tomb,  where  they  solemnly  asked,  "Whom 
seek  ye?" 

"  Sir,"  answered  a  deacon  whom  Vian  now  recognized 
as  a  violent  lover  of  the  abbot's  wine,  —  "  sir,  if  you  have 
taken  him  off,  tell  us."  The  cross  then  shone  in  the 
priest's  hand;  and  the  Marys  kissed  the  tomb. 

Vian  was  half  inclined  to  feel  repentant  that  he  had 
allowed  his  mind  to  be  critical  at  all,  as  he  remembered 
his  own  past.  Indeed,  he  was  about  ready  to  yield  to 
the  assumption  that  the  personal  character  of  a  priest 
could  in  no  way  affect  the  value  of  his  ministrations.  At 
that  moment,  however,  a  trifling  and  base  monk,  who 
had  only  the  recommendation  of  possessing  a  certain 
dramatic  talent,  appeared  clothed  in  a  white  alb  and 
stole,  stood  before  the  sepulchre,  and  said,  "  Mary  !  " 

The  deacon  habited  as  Mary  was  instantly  at  his  feet ; 
and  the  profligate  who  continued  to  act  his  part,  blessed, 
bowed,  uttered  sacred  phrases,  until  the  censer  was  lifted 
before  the  altar,  and  Vian  found  himself  trying  to  sing 
the  "Te  Deum." 

A  shaken  faith  is  never  so  weak  as  when  it  tries  to 
sing.  Every  tone  was  dirge-like. 

"This  night  is  the  beginning  of  Easter  week,"  said  he  ; 
"monks  cannot  converse  in  the  cloister,  thanks  to  the 


268  MOATK  AND  KNIGHT. 

saints  for  that !  I  should  say  something  very  sinful,  if  I 
could  talk  in  the  cloisters.  Ah,  yes  !  I  will  read  my  book 
which  enlightens  me  concerning  the  transmigration  of 
souls." 

But  Giovanni  would  not  let  Vian  read  or  remain  quiet. 
Too  good  a  chance  was  this  for  the  stirring  up  of  the 
Wycliffite  ancestry  which  slumbered  not  within  Vian's 
veins ;  if  only  Fra  Giovanni  could  catch  him,  Vian's  day 
would  be  made  miserable  indeed. 


CHAPTER   XXV. 

THE    GROWING   PROBLEM. 
"  Et  exiit  nesciens  qui  iret." 

IT  was  soon  smiling  summer  within  and  without  the 
abbey  walls.  Fra  Giovanni  had  persuaded  the 
abbot  that  Vian  needed  fresh  air;  and  Richard  Beere 
allowed  them  a  freedom  about  the  whole  valley  and  the 
Avalonian  hills  quite  unequalled. 

"  How  is  it,"  said  Vian,  who  never  abused  his  liberty 
to  go  without,  "  that  I  am  permitted  a  liberty  that  no 
other  brother  has?" 

The  monk  was  growing  suspicious  that  Abbot  Richard 
was  actually  anxious  to  terminate  his  connection  with 
Glastonbury.  The  thought  wounded  his  spirit,  —  a  spirit 
without  a  trace  of  sourness  in  it,  which  therefore  made 
him  nestle  close  to  the  abbey,  as  a  boy  who  is  sweet- 
tempered  will  cling  even  to  one  who  is  tired  of  him. 

Never  does  such  a  soul  cling  so  tenderly  to  institutions 
as  when  the  faith  of  which  they  are  the  embodiments 
seems  to  be  fading  away  out  of  his  thought.  Never  did 
Vian  find  so  much  within  those  walls,  over  which  he  had 
climbed  once  to  follow  More  and  Erasmus,  as  now,  when 
for  a  reasonable  grasp  upon  the  Catholic  faith,  he  would 
have  willingly  given  up  all  heresies,  heretics,  and  new 


27O  MONK  AND  KNIGHT. 

learning,  with  his  books,  yea,  the  world  itself,  which  had 
recently  grown  so  interesting. 

"  There  is,  however,"  said  he,  "  something  so  reason- 
able within  these  new  ideas  that  I  do  not  seem  to  possess 
them  at  all.  Rather,  they  possess  me.  It  seems  foolish 
for  me  to  talk  about  my  giving  them  up.  Rather,  let  me 
say,  will  they  give  me  up?  " 

How  rapidly  was  this  English  protester  also  getting 
beyond  the  protestantism  of  the  German  monk,  even 
unto  the  protestantism  of  which  blind  followers  of  the 
German  monk  have  been  fearful,  —  even  unto  the  prot- 
estantism of  Coleridge,  with  his  belief  in  Scripture  inspi- 
ration grounded  upon  the  fact,  "  The  Bible  finds  me  !  " 
And  yet  how  often  would  Vian  return,  vainly  seeking  to 
assure  himself  that  he  had  not  gone  very  far,  after  all ! 

Beautiful  Glastonbury  !  It  was  becoming  as  beautiful 
as  is  the  grave  of  a  lost  belief,  from  which  the  soul  never 
desires  to  depart. 

The  redwings  were  flying  upon  the  walls  with  the  last 
of  the  meadow-berries  in  their  bills ;  and  the  few  field- 
fares, which  had  not  gone  away  with  winter  and  spring, 
were  chasing  after  the  gray  wagtails  upon  the  high 
enclosure,  as  if  they  too  ought  to  be  gone.  In  the 
churchyard  the  willow-warbler,  having  swept  upward 
from  the  neighborhood  of  the  stream,  and  now  resting 
upon  the  sarcophagus  of  King  Arthur  or  flitting  over  to 
the  pyramids  near  by,  was  uttering  from  his  light  yellow 
breast  cadences  such  as  he  alone  in  England  may  create 
out  of  the  innumerable  half-tones  with  which  he  and  the 
black-cap  have  to  do,  with  such  varying  mastery.  Yellow- 
hammers  were  pushing  their  way  into  the  elms  with  an 
offensive  energy,  which  made  Vian  think  of  some  reformer 
pecking  away  upon  a  defunct  article  of  belief,  simply  be- 
cause it  is  easy  to  make  a  hole  in  it ;  and  down  in  the 
sacred  spring  audacious  blue-tits  were  taking  baths ;  or 
along  the  stone  sides  of  St.  Joseph's  Chapel  nut-hatchers 


THE   GROWING  PROBLEM.  2/1 

and  tree-creepers  were  finding  insects,  and  chattering 
about  it,  as  would  a  jovial  heretic  concerning  some  of  the 
follies  of  the  Church  which  he  had  discovered.  Black- 
birds were  never  so  lustrous  or  so  noisy ;  thrushes  were 
never  so  abundant  or  familiar  with  Glastonbury  thorn. 
White-throats  were  never  so  careless  about  their  notes, 
which  came  indifferently  in  the  form  of  a  squawk  or  a 
warble ;  while  the  chiff-chaff's  tone  was  as  mellow  as  the 
sunshine  which  enwrapped  in  a  mist  of  gold  the  dark 
brown  nightingale,  that  "  creature  of  a  fiery  heart." 

"  But  what  of  all  these  ?  "  said  Vian,  as  he  and  Giovanni 
walked  along  over  the  green  waste, —  for  such  the  soft 
sward  came  to  be,  the  instant  Vian  began  to  think. 
"  These  birds  do  not  get  their  creed  here.  Those  build- 
ings and  our  ceremonies  lie  at  the  other  extreme  of  life. 
Not  a  solitary  tone  could  that  robin  yonder  extract  out 
of  all  our  fussy  processions  and  ornamented  festival 
cloths." 

"  No,"  answered  Giovanni,  who  put  into  the  bird's 
throat  only  as  much  of  naturalism  as  our  modern  com- 
mentator inserts  of  supernaturalism,  —  "  no,  Vian,  the  bird 
is  a  pure  pagan.  You  are  getting  the  right  point  of  view. 
You  feel  as  you  ought  to  feel,  that  what  the  bird  has,  you 
ought  to  have  ;  what  the  bird  is,  you  ought  to  be,  — 
simply  natural,  without  any  creed  about  sounds  and  sky 
and  abbots.  What  the  bird  knows  about  the  sky  is 
enough  ;  it  flies  right  into  it.  What  the  bird  knows  about 
life  is  sufficient ;  it  just  lives  it,  and  asks  no  questions. 
It  has  no  theories  about  sounds ;  it  just  sings.  We  have 
theories.  When  they  become  a  little  worn,  and  when 
many  people  believe  that  they  are  the  last  theories  we  shall 
ever  get,  we  make  them  into  creeds.  When  we  think 
they  will  not  last  without  defences,  we  build  great  mon- 
asteries in  which  to  teach  and  mumble  and  preach  them. 
When  they  become  quite  doubtful,  we  burn  people  in  their 
name.  We  religious  birds  kill  others,  not  because  they 


2/2  MONK  AND  KNIGHT. 

do  not  sing  well,  but  either  because  they  do  not  sing  our 
tune,  or  because  they  do  not  hold  to  our  opinions  about 
sounds.  That  is  the  beginning  and  end  of  it,  Vian.  These 
birds  are  all  pagans ;  they  do  as  Nature  tells  them." 

Vian  was  entirely  dazzled  for  a  moment  by  this  very 
bright  philosophy  of  spiritual  struggle. 

He  looked  into  the  calm  blue  of  Giovanni's  eye,  noted 
again  the  Grecian  cast  of  his  features  as  never  before, 
and  beheld  on  his  lips  the  expression  of  that  view  of  man 
and  his  possibilities  which  in  the  nineteenth  century  has 
found  a  poet  —  the  most  Grecian  of  our  choir  of  singers 
—  whose  song  has  this  one  ethical  note,  — 

"  Wouldst  thou  be  as  these  are,  live  as  they, 
Unaffrighted  by  the  silence  round  them, 
Undistracted  by  the  sights  they  see." 

Surely  this  was,  this  is,  the  Renaissance,  in  its  ministry 
concerning  creed-making  and  practical  conduct,  —  be  it 
the  Renaissance  of  the  sixteenth  century  under  Pico  della 
Mirandola,  or  the  Renaissance  of  the  nineteenth  century 
under  Matthew  Arnold,  —  "a  revival  of  the  spirit  of 
classical  antiquity ;  a  restoration  of  the  divinity,  the  joy- 
ousness  of  Nature,  discerning  little  or  perhaps  nothing  of 
a  steadfast  faith  in  humanity,  an  eager  aspiration  after 
justice,  or  a  recognition  of  the  equality  of  rights  amongst 
all  mankind." 

Was  that  to  be  all?  All,  indeed,  until  the  intellect 
communicated  its  light  to  the  conscience.  In  Vian,  the 
child  of  a  Wycliffite,  that  communication  between  intellect 
and  conscience  was  in  the  blood. 

"  Alas,  Fra  Giovanni !  "  said  he,  as  he  stood  over  the 
nest  of  a  sedge-warbler  which  his  foot  had  just  disturbed, 
and  which  he  had  watched  as  it  flew  out  into  the  pur- 
ple radiance,  "  you  come  from  Italy,  bringing  with  you 
the  revival  of  learning.  Something  beside  this  is  in  the 
air.  Your  own  Greece  had  such  kind  of  humanity,  —  no 


THE   GROWING  PROBLEM.  2/3 

Holy  Church  there  to  repress  its  thinking ;  such  kind  of 
a  man  wrote  the  '  Phaedo'  as  could  not  be  a  pagan  and 
nothing  more.  Plato  was  a  prophet,  as  was  also  Malachi, 
of  the  Christ." 

"What  did  Plato  prophesy?"  asked  Giovanni,  with 
interest. 

"  He  said :  '  We  must  lay  hold  of  the  best  human 
opinion,  in  order  that,  borne  on  it  as  on  a  raft,  we  may 
sail  over  the  dangerous  sea  of  life,*  unless  we  can  find  a 
stronger  boat,  or  some  word  of  God,  which  will  more 
surely  and  safely  carry  us.'  " 

Giovanni  was  silent  for  a  moment ;  and  when  he  be- 
gan to  speak,  Vian  continued :  "  But  this  is  what  I 
wanted  to  say,  —  the  bird  has  no  need  of  a  creed.  Per- 
haps I  have  no  need  of  one.  The  bird  has  not  my  feel- 
ing of  aspiration  and  of  dependence,  or  my  thirst  for 
the  infinite.  These  are  as  much  for  me  and  for  my  life  as 
the  bird's  wings  or  the  bird's  cry  for  his  life.  My  wings 
are  these  desires  and  impulses  toward  what  we  call  truth. 
I  must  work  them,  if  I  dare  to  be  a  man,  as  the  bird 
must  work  his  wings  to  reach  a  bird's  destiny.  Giovanni, 
with  a  bird's  problems  and  solutions,  I  could  easily  adopt 
and  live  inside  a  bird's  philosophy  of  life.  With  a  man's 
problems,  I  must  have,  somewhere  and  at  some  time,  a 
philosophy  of  life  as  comprehensive  as  man  is.  It  may 
be  that  the  search  for  it  is  all  I  may  be  permitted  to 
have.  Even  so ;  then  I  shall  get  a  man's  manhood  in 
searching  for  it." 

"  Well,"  said  old  Giovanni,  quite  swept  from  his  own 
position  by  the  nobility  of  Vian's  purpose,  "  you  will  get 
truth  too.  Indeed,  manhood  is  only  truth  in  the  form 
of  humanity." 

"  Well,  then,"  said  Vian,  who  was  not  likely  to  stop  at 

negatives,  "  it  may  be  true  that  I  will  get  —  yes,  every 

soul  must  obtain  the  creed,  and  all  the  creed  which  it 

needs,  by  its  singing  and  flying,  just  as  the  bird  gets  its 

VOL.  i.  —  1 8 


2/4  MONK  AND  KNIGHT. 

belief — no  !  "  and  Vian  saw  for  the  first  time  the  rela- 
tive greatness  of  belief  and  faith,  —  "its  faith,"  said  he, 
deliberately,  — "  the  working  belief,  the  creed  in  its 
throat  and  wings,  which  it  is  willing  to  sing  with  and  fly 
with.  Ah,  Giovanni,  I  am  in  deep  water,  but  I  see  my 
way  out.  I  mean  this,"  —  and  Vian  began  again, — 
"  every  man  gets  his  faith  for  himself  by  flying  out  upon 
his  dream  of  destiny." 

But  that  statement  seemed  to  disappoint  him. 

"  I  do  not  understand  you  now,"  wheezed  the  Italian. 

"  I  do  not  believe  that  I  do,"  laughed  Vian,  as  he 
grappled  again  with  the  thought  which  lies  at  the  root  of 
all  saving  faith  (if  by  that  we  mean  the  faith  that  saves) . 
"I  mean,"  pursued  he,  "that  these  thirsts  for  the  truth, 
for  goodness,  for  the  infinite  are  whispers  of  destiny. 
The  eternal  beauty  is  for  me,  if  I  yearn  for  it.  Com- 
munion with  God  is  for  me,  if  I  believe  when  I  am  at 
my  .best  that  I  cannot  do  without  it.  I  feel  vaguely  that 
righteousness  is  my  destiny ;  that  is  what  I  meant  by  a 
dream  of  destiny.  Now,  if  I  can  fling  myself  out  upon 
it,  trust  it,  sing  it,  and  fly  with  it,  as  the  bird  does  with 
what  has  come  in  like  an  instinct  into  its  breast,  I  shall 
find  out  more  and  more  about  it,  and  finally  I  shall 
know  it." 

"Yes;  but  that  will  not  be  a  creed, but  a  knowledge," 
,said  Era  Giovanni. 

"  A  creed  is  made  up  of  facts  which  I  know,"  said  the 
eager  monk.  "  But  there  will  always  be  a  feeling  of  the 
existence  of  a  truth  just  beyond  the  truth,  which  I  have 
found  out  by  trusting  my  being  to  the  one  the  presence 
of  which  just  before  I  had  felt ;  and  that  dreamed  of  truth 
I  shall  reckon  upon  as  a  fact  too.  That  will  be  my  be- 
lief too." 

Giovanni  was  now  so  far  into  Vian's  soul,  that  he 
dared  not  be  rude  with  airing  his  own  settled  doubt,  — 
doubt  which,  like  most  scepticism,  had  grown  up  under 


THE  GROWING  PROBLEM.  275 

the  shadow  of  superstitions  or  under  the  miasma  gener- 
ated by  dead  articles  of  faith  which  had  never  felt  the 
touch  of  his  personal  life ;  but  he  ventured  to  put  a  sin- 
gle question,  which  drew  from  Vian  his  deepest  radicalism. 

"What,  then,"  said  the  Italian,  "  if  one  can  make  all 
the  creed  he  needs  by  doing  with  a  man's  highest  in- 
stincts or  suspicions  what  the  bird  does  by  its  character- 
istic impulses,  —  I  say,  what  then  are  the  uses  of  the 
Scriptures,  which  your  Wycliffite  father  and  the  Lollards 
desired  to  put  into  the  hands  of  the  common  ignorant 
people,  for  their  salvation?" 

Vian  was  now  so  far  advanced  with  his  philosophy  of 
faith,  that  the  question  did  not  pause  upon  Giovanni's 
lips  for  a  reply. 

"Why,  "  said  the  younger  monk,  "  I  know  the  import 
of  your  question.  You  would  make  me  out  a  disbeliever 
in  the  Scriptures  because  I  do  not  believe  somebody's 
interpretation  of  them ;  or  you  say  that  my  views  of  the 
way  of  finding  truths  for  one's  creed  would  leave  nothing 
for  the  Revelation  to  do  for  men's  faith.  You  want  to 
know  the  answer  to  this :  if  by  doing  righteousness  in 
following  one's  best  suspicions,  one  finds  out  what  one 
needs  to  know,  why  did  God  give  such  a  revelation,  and 
why  should  the  common  people  have  it  for  themselves?  " 

"Precisely,"  said  the  anxious  Italian.  "The  age  be- 
hind us  worshipped  the  Church  ;  the  next  age  will  prob- 
ably worship  a  book." 

"Well,"  said  Vian,  as  he  took  his  vellum  copy  of 
Wycliffe's  New  Testament  from  beneath  his  cope,  "  the 
Scriptures  have  within  them  a  revelation,  —  a  most  neces- 
sary revelation.  Of  course,  we  are  here  alone,  and  I 
can  talk  with  you  freely.  We  may  then  put  out  of  our 
minds  much  of  this  monkish  talk  about  the  Blessed  Vir- 
gin. This  book  is  not  her  biography." 

Giovanni  was  both  amazed  and  amused  at  Vian's  in- 
trepidity. Neither  of  them  could  feel,  however,  that 


2/6  MONK  AND    KNIGHT. 

these  curious  views  of  this  monk,  who  had  been  simply 
driven  from  point  to  point,  as  a  protester,  would  some 
day  be  shared  by  others,  or  become  the  means  of  depop- 
ulating theological  seminaries.  Giovanni  had  uncon- 
sciously hinted  that  perhaps  the  Reformers,  which  he  had 
heard  of,  were  likely  to  institute  bibliolatry.  Neither  saw 
that  a  true  use  of  the  Scriptures  would  ultimately  hurry 
the  human  soul  from  the  Scriptures  themselves  to  the 
Christ  whom  they  revealed.  Long,  however,  has  been 
the  battle  of  Christianity  against  both  ecclesiolatry  and 
bibliolatry. 

"  This  book  is  the  story  of  the  appearance  and  words 
of  God's  revelation  of  Himself  in  humanity,  in  His  incar- 
nation in  Jesus  Christ  who  is  our  Lord.  The  books  of 
the  Old  Testament  —  and  John  Wycliffe  has  translated 
all  —  are  the  history  of  that  hope  which  God  gave  to 
mankind.  In  this  New  Testament  the  hope  is  realized. 
Plato,  as  I  believe,  was  a  prophet.  Christ  is  that  '  word 
of  God,'  for  which  he  looked.  Now,  all  who  in  any  age 
or  place  have  done  righteousness  are  accepted  of  God. 
This  the  Scriptures  teach.  He  has  not  left  himself  with- 
out a  witness  in  any  time.  Cicero  and  Pythagoras  are 
witnesses.  Mankind  would  have  gone  on,  could  have 
gone  on  obtaining  more  truth,  as  I  say,  by  trusting  them- 
selves to  what  they  had  already;  but  in  the  fulness  of 
time,  God,  who  had  been  making  revelations  of  Himself 
in  many  ways,  rinding  the  world  ready,  revealed  Himself 
just  as  any  father  would,  in  His  Son.  Do  you  understand 
me?" 

"Yes;  but  it  is  like  a  vague  vision  to  me,"  said 
Giovanni. 

"  These  Scriptures  come  to  a  man,  who  is  like  a  bird, 
doing  what  he  ought  with  his  instincts  to  sing  —  that 
is,  trying  to  make  life  harmonious  —  and  to  fly,  —  that  is, 
to  go  upward  and  onward  in  everything.  They  come  as 
a  revelation,  not  only  of  something  outside  of  him,  such 


THE   GROWING  PROBLEM. 


277 


as  the  fact  that  his  Father  will  save  him  from  sin,  but  of 
something  inside  of  him.  They  show  the  righteousness 
of  these  aspirations,  and  the  godliness  of  these  thirsts  of 
his  soul.  The  Scriptures  have  a  revelation  of  One  who 
fulfils  all  the  unfulfilled,  and  makes  humanity  sure  of  the 
path  below  which  tends  heavenward,  by  the  fact  that  we 
see  that  it  runs  straight  into  the  path  from  the  throne  of 
God,  coming  this  way  toward  earth.  Oh  !  " —  and  Vian 
gave  it  up,  — "  you  do  not  see  it  «.s  I  seem  to  see  it 
sometimes." 

"Well,  then,"  said  Giovanni,  who  saw  more  than  did 
Vian  of  the  consequences  of  such  opinions,  "all  truth 
will  harmonize  with  the  truth  of  Scriptures." 

"  Yes ;  when,  as  the  birds,  we  sing  it  and  fly  with  it. 
Do  you  know  what  I  mean  ?  We  must  get  out  of  abbeys, 
where  our  throats  are  tied  up  and  our  wings  are  clipped ; 
we  must  live  truth  to  know  that  it  is  truth.  It  will  all 
harmonize.  I  begin  to  see  now  that  the  doctrine  of  the 
transmigration  of  the  soul  in  Pythagoras  is  like  Paul's 
doctrine." 

It  had  grown  late.  Fra  Giovanni  and  Vian  hurried 
back  to  the  abbey  to  find  no  less  an  ecclesiastic  than 
the  sub-chanter  sound  asleep  in  Vian's  cell.  The  lantern 
which  was  used  in  the  Feast  of  Fools  was  burning  low ; 
and  Vian's  copy  of  the  "  Adagia  "  of  Erasmus  was  open. 
The  sub-chanter's  hand  was  resting  on  the  passage  which 
has  been  thus  translated :  "  Wilt  thou  know  what  are 
the  true  riches  for  a  pope?  Listen  to  the  first  of  the 
Popes  :  <  Silver  and  gold  have  I  none ;  but  such  as  I 
have  give  I  thee.  In  the  name  of  Jesus,  rise  and 
walk.' " 

"Sub-chanters  will  not  sleep  on  that  text  always,"  said 
Giovanni. 


CHAPTER   XXVI. 

AN    IMPASSABLE    ABYSS. 


Love  works  at  the  centre, 

Heart -heaving  alway ; 
Forth  speed  the  strong  pulses 

To  the  borders  of  day. 

EMERSON. 


AS,  on  the  morning  of  the  2Oth  of  April,  Alke 
started  from  the  cottage  to  tend  the  goats,  it  was 
noticeable  that  for  some  reason  she  was  anxious  to  assure 
herself  of  the  safety  of  the  Virgil  manuscript,  which  had 
been  in  her  possession  for  nearly  a  twelvemonth.  She 
also,  and  most  lovingly,  asserted  her  independence  of 
Caspar's  overmastering  information  as  to  the  best  nooks 
among  the  mountains  in  which  the  lean  goats  might 
obtain  nourishing  pasture. 

Alke  had  been  possessed  of  strange  and  incommuni- 
cable feelings  since  she  had  made  the  promise  of  a  day 
before  to  meet  the  young  peasant,  who  had  so  delighted 
her  with  finding  a  purchaser  for  her  illuminations,  and 
who  had  obliged  her  still  more  deeply  with  the  Virgil 
manuscript. 

"  My  child,"  said  Caspar,  "  I  have  surest  confidence 
in  you ;  and  yet,  if  I  had  believed,  as  do  the  monks  of 
Turin,  in  the  Devil's  part  in  this  world,  I  should  have 
said  that  my  Alke  had  met  the  Devil,  and  that  he  had 


AN  IMPASSABLE  ABYSS.  279 

given  you  the  manuscript.  It  is  certain  that  the  parch- 
ment which  you  fetched  to  me  is  the  manuscript  for 
which  Erasmus  came  to  Turin  many  years  ago." 

Alke  had  refused,  for  the  sake  of  the  pledge  which 
she  had  given  to  the  youth,  even  to  describe  him  to 
her  father;  and  the  scholarly  Caspar  had  willingly 
allowed  his  child  the  privilege  of  making  this  refusal. 
Not  a  syllable  had  been  spoken  to  the  Barbe  of  her 
possession. 

"The  Barbe  is  really  afraid  that  we  are  becoming 
heretics  here, — pagans,  indeed,  I  ought  to  say.  He  tells 
me  that  this  is  all  a  revival,  not  of  Christian,  but  of  pagan 
Rome.  He  looks  at  my  Aldine  ( Homer  '  and  '  Demos- 
thenes,' and  shrugging  his  shoulders,  he  flees  to  '  Nobla 
Leycon,'  and  the  '  Babylonian  Captivity,' "  said  the  child 
of  the  Renaissance. 

"The  Barbe"  has  looked  with  wonder  at  the  coins 
which  Master  Erasmus  left  for  me  so  long  ago,"  added 
Alke. 

"What  said  he?  I  did  not  know  he  had  seen 
them." 

"He  took  the  one  on  which  is  the  head  of  Jupiter, 
and  he  said :  '  Child !  your  father  loves  Greece  and 
Rome  too  well.  Our  city  is  neither  Athens  nor  Rome, 
but  Jerusalem.  Our  God  is  the  Omnipotent  Father ; ' 
and  then  he  spoke  sharply  to  me  :  '  Child  !  Diocletian, 
the  persecutor  of  Christians,  worshipped  at  the  shrine 
of  Jupiter.'  " 

"What  answer  made  you,  daughter?" 

"That  I  did  not  worship  any  images." 

"What  said  our  Barbe?  " 

"  He  said  that  the  things  of  Greece  and  Rome  were 
carnal  and  unsavory.  He  would  not  have  me  worship 
either  the  Virgin  or  ancient  and  fabulous  gods." 

Caspar  was  all  interest,  and  was  also  not  a  little  rebel- 
lious in  his  heart  against  the  Barb£.  Thorough  Walden- 


28O  MONK  AND  KNIGHT. 

sian  that  he  was,  he  knew  that  neither  his  fraternity  nor 
his  minister  understood  the  all-illuminating  effect  of  the 
revival  of  ancient  learning  upon  Mediaeval  Europe.  In 
every  line  of  Erasmus  he  read  the  effect  of  the  Renais- 
sance in  the  preparation  it  had  made  and  was  yet  making 
for  a  reformation.  These  very  coins  had  made  Caspar 
a  freer  man. 

''Our  Barb6  cannot  understand  it,"  said  he  to  Alke. 
"You  must  make  for  him  a  beautiful  copy  of  the  canticle 
he  loves  most." 

As  Alke,  before  going  forth  to  the  pastures,  had  taken 
the  canticle  in  her  hand,  eager  to  find  such  suggestions 
of  color  in  Nature  or  in  her  own  soul  as  would  enrich  its 
spiritual  harmonies,  she  felt  as  honest  a  pride  in  being 
able  to  convince  the  Barbe"  of  her  orthodoxy  as  she  felt 
in  possessing  the  Virgil  manuscript,  for  the  sight  of  which 
the  eyes  of  Erasmus  were  still  longing.  Her  sunny  hair 
floated  down  to  her  homely  girdle  with  a  freedom  which 
was  descriptive  of  her  hope,  as  for  an  instant  she  dreamed 
of  attaching  to  herself  the  friendship  of  the  Barbe,  or  of 
obtaining  some  other  such  treasure  from  the  hands  of  the 
youth  whom  so  soon  she  was  to  see. 

How  had  she  obtained  the  Virgil  manuscript  ? 

"  I  can  never  tell  my  own  soul,"  she  said,  "  how  it 
came  about.  When  did  I  first  see  this  remarkable  friend  ? 
I  do  not  remember  how  it  has  all  happened.  When  did 
my  father  consent  that  I  should  take  to  him  my  pictures 
and  receive  coins  from  his  hand  ?  I  do  not  know  why 
I  should  try  to  find  out.  This  youth  has  often  told  me 
that  the  village  priest  would  not  allow  him  to  buy  my 
pictures  if  he  knew  that  a  Waldensian  had  painted  them. 
It  appears  reasonable  enough.  I  have  been  silent  —  too 
silent?  Have  I  done  wrong?  No;  I  have  kept  the 
fiends  of  hunger  and  cold  from  our  doorway,  and  I  am 
glad.  He  has  said  that  he  was  glad  to  talk  with  me 
about  the  poets  and  singers  of  the  olden  time.  Has  it 


AN  IMPASSABLE  ABYSS.  28 1 

been  wrong?  He  has  known  that  I  am  a  Waldensian's 
daughter,  and  —  " 

Alke  was  in  a  different  mood  when  these  considera- 
tions had  pressed  themselves  upon  her  in  this  soliloquy. 
She  felt,  however,  that  for  some  reason  this  must  be  the 
last  time  she  should  meet  him  without  the  knowledge  of 
her  father. 

"  My  Saviour  knows  that  I  have  not  done  —  no,  I 
have  not  thought  —  wrong.  Hereafter,  alas  !  hereafter 
I  shall  do  wrong  if  I  see  him  again,"  she  whispered. 

What  may  be  called  her  father's  Puritanism  had  kept 
her  from  telling  him  what  had  gone  on,  from  time  to 
time,  within  the  soul  of  this  almost  companionless  girl 
who  loved  learning.  She  now  tried  to  think  of  something 
beside  her  new  moral  problem.  Her  mind  found  no  ease 
in  contemplating  the  contrast,  of  which  she  was  aware, 
between  the  condition  of  her  Waldensian  neighbors  near 
La  Torre  and  that  of  herself  and  her  father.  She  knew 
not  with  whomsoever  she  might  hold  converse  concerning 
the  things  which  were  dearest  to  her  above  all  else,  save 
religion,  if  she  were  to  lose  the  infrequent  companionship 
of  this  youth. 

"  Beside  my  father  and  the  Barbe",  who  does  not  like 
to  talk  of  Greece  or  Rome,  there  is  none." 

For  the  first  time  the  maiden  felt  a  pang  at  the  pros- 
pect. Never  appeared  so  low  and  poor  the  life  of  the 
other  Waldensians  with  whom  formerly  as  a  child,  now 
as  a  teacher  and  sympathetic  friend  and  half-adored 
cynosure  of  all  hearts,  she  had  lived,  feeling  betimes 
that  the  kingdom  of  God  on  earth  had  something, 
not  perhaps  better,  but  possibly  as  good,  and  withal 
more  pleasant  and  comfortable  for  her.  As  she  went 
along  toward  the  pastures,  passing  cottage  after  cottage, 
from  which  the  little  children  came  swarming  to  greet 
her,  begging  also  to  follow  her,  she  pitied  the  lives 
which  were  able  to  endure,  even  at  the  demand  of  such 


282  MONK  AND  KNIGHT. 

penury  as  had  been  hers,  a  life  without  culture  and  its 
hopes. 

"  But  this  feeling  is  altogether  ignoble  and  unworthy 
of  a  Christian,"  she  kept  saying,  as  with  the  canticle  in 
her  hand  she  looked  into  the  cottages,  seeing  infants 
who  were  crying  in  their  cradles,  recognizing  older  chil- 
dren who  by  means  of  ladders  had  come  out  of  the 
upper  apartments  of  these  galleried  homes,  and  who  were 
yelling  lustily  for  the  chance  of  kissing  her  whom  they 
had  learned  to  reverence,  while  she  paused  to  smile  upon 
some  demure  girl  who  was  teaching  the  younger  ones  of 
a  family  the  catechism. 

Amid  all  this,  her  mind  was  set  upon  the  fact  that, 
day  after  day,  she  had  been  meeting  a  young  man  who, 
she  did  not  doubt,  was  a  Romanist ;  that  she  had  even 
allowed  him,  when  the  passion  for  literature  swallowed  up 
all  ideas  of  propriety,  to  give  her  a  priceless  parchment ; 
that  she  had  so  believed  in  her  own  good  cause  of 
keeping  starvation  from  the  door  of  her  father,  and  had 
so  confided  in  the  young  man's  word,  which  had  never 
proven  false,  as  to  furnish  him  with  illuminations  which 
he  had  conveyed  to  the  Monastery  of  Turin.  Could  it 
all  be  wrong? 

It  flashed  upon  her :  "  He  may  be  a  novice,  or  even  a 
monk,  in  disguise." 

It  was  of  some  comfort  to  reflect,  in  this  connection,  that 
secrecy  could  be  depended  upon  as  a  necessity  upon  his 
part,  and  that,  whatever  might  happen  in  what  Alke  had 
determined  should  be  a  last  interview,  she  had  brought 
no  shame  either  upon  her  father  or  his  cause,  and  that, 
as  she  herself  said,  "  never  was  the  Virgil  manuscript  so 
safe." 

Soon  after  she  had  reached  the  pastures,  Alke  saw  the 
young  man  coming  around  the  abrupt  hillside,  and  bearing 
a  heavy  load  of  wood  upon  his  back. 

"  For  whom  do  you  gather  fagots  at  this  hour  in  the 


AN  IMPASSABLE  ABYSS.  283 

morning?  "  inquired  Alke,  her  opening  lips  as  ruddy  as 
the  rose  of  dawn  whose  vanishing  petals  still  lay  upon 
the  hills.  Her  voice,  which  usually  was  made  weary  by 
this  time  by  outpouring  its  song  upon  the  morning,  was 
not  free  from  a  certain  stern  and  penetrative  sharpness 
which  the  young  man  had  never  felt  in  it  before. 

The  inquiry  was  altogether  too  unexpected ;  and  any 
attempt  to  answer  it  would  be  too  perilous.  The  youth 
tried  to  feign  dulness  of  hearing  and  preoccupation  of 
mind  or  interest  in  the  canticle  which,  by  this  time,  Alke 
had  found  to  be  full  of  artistic  possibilities.  Indeed,  so 
many  were  his  attempts  to  escape  the  force  of  her  query 
that  he  succeeded  in  none.  For  the  first  time  the  na- 
tures had  measured  each  other's  strength. 

"  You  would  answer  me  manfully,"  she  said  ;  and  she 
closed  the  canticle  from  his  view,  hiding  also  her  bare 
feet  beneath  her  coarse  skirt,  —  "  you  would  answer  me 
manfully,  I  say,  if  there  were  no  evil  intention  in  your 
coming  here." 

Alke  was  likely  to  speak  too  strongly,  especially  when 
a  suspicion  of  priestcraft  crossed  her  mind. 

"  Do  you  gather  fagots  for  him  for  whom  you  gather 
illuminations?  " 

The  young  man  was  sure  that  he  looked  like  a  novice, 
acted  like  a  priest,  and  that,  if  he  talked  at  all,  he  would 
make  her  certain  that  he  was  a  monk,  so  guilty  did  his 
soul  confess  him  to  be  of  duplicity  in  the  cause  of  love. 

"  Maiden  !  "  ventured  he. 

"  Ah  !  I  have  discerned  the  priest's  tone  in  that  talk. 
With  that  word  the  monks  rob  us  !  " 

«  I  am  not  —  " 

"  I  know  not  what  you  are  trying  to  say,  but  I  must 
know  at  once  what  you  are  before  we  speak  of  aught 
else." 

Alke's  voice  was  full  of  martial  music ;  nevertheless, 
the  young  man  sat  down  upon  his  bundle  of  fagots. 


284  MONK  AND  KNIGHT. 

"  I  will  tell  you  all,"  said  he,  as  assuringly  as  he  might, 
while  he  took  his  breath  slowly  and  generously,  —  "I 
will  confess  all." 

"  No,  this  is  not  a  confessional,  even  for  you,"  Alke 
said  with  an  abrupt  self-assurance. 

"  I  trow  not ;  but  I  do  respect  it  and  you.  And  I  have 
never  done  you  wrong.  By  the  Mass  —  " 

"  Swear  not  at  all.  *  By  the  Mass  !  '  —  that  is  a 
Romish  oath,  at  least.  Ah,  and  yet  I  knew  you  were  a 
Romanist.  Are  the  fagots  for  the  burning  of  a  heretic?  " 

"  I  will  tell  you  all ;  and  if  you  hear  me,  —  oh,  if  you 
can  hear  my  heart,  you  will  be  satisfied.  I  hope  I  shall 
be  blessed,"  said  he,  with  a  growing  confidence  in  his 
tongue. 

"  What  is  your  name?  " 

"Salmani,"  he  answered,  with  evident  relief. 

"An  Italian?" 

"  Even  so.  And  I  must  be  honest  with  you.  You 
know  I  have  never  —  I  have  not  harmed  you." 

"Never;  nor  could  you  harm  my  soul,"  exclaimed 
Alke,  with  a  shiver. 

"  I  am  not  in  holy  orders.  I  hope  I  never  shall  be  a 
priest,  if —  But  I  am  of  the  Monastery  of  Turin,  and  I 
have  been  —  " 

"  My  saviour  !  "  cried  Alke,  looking  up  into  heaven. 

"  Yes,  maiden,  I  have  been  your  saviour."  Salmani 
arose,  his  face  radiant  with  hope. 

"  Advance  not,  Priest !  Advance  not !  You  are  not 
my  saviour.  Even  Jesus  Christ  has  succored  me." 

Alke  was  trembling  with  a  courageous  purpose  which 
even  she  did  not  understand ;  while  Salmani  said  with 
admirable  coolness  and  great  calculation,  — 

"  Your  Saviour  has  saved  you  from  —  even  from  me. 
I  have  saved  you  from  the  monks.  Let  me  tell  you  my 
story.  You  will  respect  me;  perhaps  you  may  even — " 

"  Stop,  Salmani !     I  must  get  to  my  father." 


AN  IMPASSABLE  ABYSS.  285 

"  Alke,  you  are  as  safe  with  me.  For  your  Saviour's 
sake,  I  will  respect  you." 

"  You  must!  "  The  words  flashed  from  her  burning 
lips. 

"  Your  Saviour  in  you,  in  your  life,  in  your  faith,  has 
saved  you,  even  from  me.  I  could  not,  oh,  I  could  not 
do  you  wrong,  as  I  have  heard  you  talk  of  your  Saviour. 
Oh  that  your  Saviour  were  mine  !  " 

At  last  Alke  was  touched.  She  .might  take  her  Sa- 
viour even  into  the  bosom  of  this  disguised  novice  or 
lay-brother,  —  she  knew  not  which  he  was.  The  very 
thought  of  winning  in  such  a  conquest  for  her  Lord 
made  her  fearless. 

"  If  his  scarred  hand  is  upon  your  heart,  I  will  trust 
even  one  who  has  acted  a  hideous  lie  with  me,"  she  said. 
"  You  have  told  me  that  you  would  tell  me  all." 

Tears  were  close  behind  Alke's  words. 

"  You  remember  that  you  lost  a  sheet  of  empurpled 
parchment  containing  the  Pater  Noster — " 

"  Our  Lord's  Prayer,"  interjected  the  Waldensian. 

"  Containing  the  Lord's  Prayer —  " 

"  Our  Lord's  Prayer,"  insisted  the  dogmatic  Alke. 

"  Our  Lord's  Prayer,"  repeated  the  submissive  novice. 
"  You  lost  it  at  La  Torre." 

"  I  remember,"  was  the  reply. 

"  It  was  I,  —  then  a  novice  at  Turin,  —  I  found  it. 
The  priests  of  that  monastery  were  intent  on  finding  the 
secret  of  empurpling  parchment.  Then  they  grew  more 
anxious  to  have  the  hand  and  skill  which  created  such 
letters  as  were  inscribed  upon  it.  They  found  out  Caspar 
Perrin's  daughter.  You  have  knowledge  of  our  law, 
Alke?" 

"  I  know,"  replied  the  agitated  girl,  "that  there  is  an 
infamous  law  which  makes  it  possible  for  priests  to  seize 
and  carry  off  the  children  of  those  who  are  called 
heretics." 


286  MONK  AND  KNIGHT. 

"Your  inscriptions  were  so  beautiful." 

"  And  you  were  sent  to  seize  me?  " 

"  No ;  I  shall  confess  it.  I  was  sent  to  La  Torre  to 
be  instructed  of  the  priest  and  to  obey  him.  You  know 
that  the  Waldensians  are  strong  and  numerous  here. 
The  priest  was  minded  to  act  cautiously." 

"  And  our  God  is  omnipotent,"  added  Alke,  her  bosom 
swelling  with  grateful  feeling  to  Heaven. 

"  I  was  told  to  obtain  the  secret." 

"  And  you  could  not,  because  my  father  alone  knows 
how  to  empurple  parchment." 

"  Even  so,"  said  Salmani.  "  And  then  I  was  instructed 
to  purchase  all  of  your  illuminations,  which  I  have  sent 
to  the  monastery.  Oh,  I  have  told  them  many  lies  to 
preserve  you  these  long  months  !  " 

"  The  cowards  have  been  very  patient  with  you,"  said 
Alke,  with  bitter  scorn. 

"  Scorn  not  me  !  "  exclaimed  the  piqued  Salmani.  "  I 
could  have  had  you  seized  at  any  moment.  But  I  did 
not,  I  could  not —  " 

"  Why  not?  Why  did  you  not  do  it?  "  inquired  Alke, 
as  she  lifted  her  head,  and  the  sun  twisted  his  most 
brilliant  threads  of  light  within  her  long,  loose  hair. 

Salmani  looked  into  the  eyes  which  were  both  dreams 
and  destinies ;  and  rising  again,  said  with  uncontrollable 
emotion,  "  I  loved  you ;  even  now  1  do  love  you." 

"  Loved  me,  Salmani,  —  loved  me  ?  " 

"  I  have  loved  you.  The  Saviour,  or  whatever  else  was 
in  your  face  and  life  —  I  could  not  do  you  wrong.  I  am  a 
lover,  though  I  am  also  a  novice  ;  and,  Alke,  I  am  at  your 
feet.  Oh,  save  me  !  " 

Even  Alke's  forehead  was  crimson ;  and  in  her  eyes 
was  a  strange  confusion  of  regret  and  honesty,  —  regret 
that  by  any  means  any  man  —  above  all,  one  so  soon  to 
be  a  priest  —  should  have  felt,  or  even  declared  that  he 
felt,  that  she  had  given  the  smallest  invitation  to  his  love  ; 


AN  IMPASSABLE  ABYSS.  287 

honesty,  also,  which  instantly  averred  with  passionate 
veracity,  "  Salmani,  I  have  never  loved  any  man  but  my 
own  father.  I.  have  never  intimated  that  any  other  affec- 
tion could  become  acceptable  to  my  heart ! "  She 
said  this  with  a  womanliness  which  at  once  confused 
Salmani. 

"But,"  said  he,  as  the  unfading  daytime  met  a  weird 
suggestion  of  night  upon  his  face,  "  my  love  is  not  like 
the  love  of  a  father.  It  is  deeper,  different.  Even 
your  innocence  understands  me." 

"  It  could  not  be  so  unselfish,"  she  replied,  as  with  the 
thought  of  her  father,  what  she  had  heard  of  monkish 
schemes  burned  into  a  flame  of  wrath,  —  wrath  which 
died  away  when  she  resolved  to  be  just  to  Salmani. 
Then  she  said,  with  something  like  pain,  "  I  could  not 
love  you." 

"  Have  I  made  the  love  of  a  monk  seem  hateful  ?  " 
said  he  beseechingly,  as  he  looked  up  from  the  green- 
mantled  pool,  into  which  his  heated  soul  longed  to  plunge 
itself,  and  saw  a  furnace-blast  in  Alke's  face,  overspread 
with  soft  but  dark  clouds  of  innocent  pitifulness.  "  You 
do  not  hate  me,"  he  dared  to  assert. 

"I  do  detest  the  associations  of  your  life.  I  hate 
the  sort  of  quiescence  with  which  you  have  heard  the 
vulgar  priests  in  the  monasteries  plan  against  my  own 
people  —  " 

"  I  did  not  listen  —  " 

"Or  oppose.  You  should  have  listened,  and  come  to 
our  deliverance,  if  you  loved  the  truth." 

"  I  brought  you  the  manuscript.  I  loved  you.  Where 
is  the  parchment?  " 

"  I  would  rather  you  had  brought  a  true  heart  of  cour- 
age to  the  help  of  God's  persecuted  ones.  I  am  nothing 
to  be  loved ;  the  truth,  Salmani,  is  everything." 

"  I  bring  it  now,  —  a  true  heart,  full  of  courage." 
Salmani  stood  like  a  statue  in  the  midst  of  a  conflagration, 


288  MONK  AND  KNIGHT. 

the  swirling  fires  seeking  to  get  hold  upon  its  rocky 
substance.  "  I  love  the  truth  in  concrete  form,"  he 
added  eagerly. 

"  You  love  the  form  more  than  you  love  the  truth 
itself.  Forms  perish.  The  Holy  Church  itself  is  only 
a  once  beautiful  form  grown  hideous.  Every  form  grows 
old  and  poor ;  the  truth,  never.  You  have  lived  in  a 
monastery.  1  loathe  the  kind  of  spirit  which  would  haunt 
a  maiden's  steps  with  a  dagger  in  one  hand  and  —  " 

"Where  is  my  manuscript?"  Salmani's  figure  as- 
sumed the  proportions  and  attitude  of  wronged  right- 
eousness ;  and  he  said  it  again  sharply :  "  Where  is  that 
manuscript?" 

"  I  hate  —  Alas  !  I  must  not  hate,"  she  whispered, 
obedient  now,  as  she  was,  to  her  sense  of  justice. 

Salmani's  lip  quivered,  and  his  feet  moved  nearer, 
when  he  broke  forth  more  piteously  and  yet  more 
angrily,  "  I  could  have  delivered  you  to  the  monks  a 
hundred  times." 

"  Never  alive  ;  never  without  this  body  of  mine  scarred 
beyond  their  power  to  harm  it !  " 

"  Oh,  Alke,  "  pleaded  he,  "  I  never  should  have  fancied 
it  possible  for  me  thus  to  kill  every  heaven-born  senti- 
ment in  my  soul." 

He  never  seemed  quite  so  interesting ;  and  the  Wal- 
densian  girl  thought  him  half  sublime  when  he  spoke. 
But  he  had  not  been  so  faithful  as  her  soul  demanded. 

Still  the  great  green  trees  stood  silent,  unvexed  by  any 
breeze.  Still  did  the  poplars  and  elms  furnish  hiding- 
places  for  the  purple  linnets  which  told  one  another  of 
their  love.  Still  did  the  flowering  meadows  stretch  from 
the  foot-hills  in  a  lovely  monotony  of  broad  magnificence, 
across  which  came  the  song  of  the  cushat.  Still  did  the 
tremulous  young  monk  look  upon  Alke,  with  his  sad  dark 
eyes.  She  saw  the  living  abstraction  called  truth.  He 
saw  only  the  concrete  manifestation  of  truth  before  him. 


AN  IMPASSABLE  ABYSS.  289 

Alke  knew  it.  Everything  but  her  heart  was  ready  for  a 
new  declaration  of  love. 

"  For  you  I  will  flee  from  the  monastic  life  and  the 
priest  of  La  Torre." 

"  Whither?"  said  Alke,  surprised  at  once  at  rinding 
her  soul  interested  in  the  possibility  of  fleeing  somewhere 
with  him ;  and  then  she  cried  out :  "  I  do  not  love  you, 
Salmani.  It  would  be  falsity  and  shame  to  tell  you  other 
than  this."  » 

"Where  is  my  manuscript?"  demanded  he,  with  an 
offended  air. 

The  justice  of  the  inquiry  again  startled  Alke,  and  once 
more  she  thought  not  only  of  flight  with  Salmani,  but  of 
the  precious  manuscript ;  then  she  thought  of  her  own 
heart.  Why  should  she  flee  ?  Alas  !  why  should  he  think 
of  flight  ? 

"  My  love  cannot  be  bought  with  Greece  or  Rome." 

In  Alke's  soul,  the  Renaissance  had  become  the 
Reformation. 

"  And  just  that  love,  unpurchasable  and  priceless,  I 
must  have  !  " 

The  half-charmed  bird  was  now  affrighted.  Amid  the 
commingled  green  and  gold  of  that  tangled  forest  of 
problems  and  partial  solutions,  the  songless  one  thought 
she  discovered  the  eyes  of  a  serpent.  "  I  must  have  !  "  — 
alas  for  Salmani !  he  spoke  it  too  commandingly,  too 
roughly.  Every  fear  of  monks  which  had  come  to  her, 
or  had  grown  up  within  her,  leaped  up  like  a  fierce 
guardian,  and  declared  her  peril.  Even  Salmani  saw 
that  the  tide  of  passionate  affection  had  run  too  high. 
Every  attitude  had  changed.  The  charming  maiden  had 
the  eye  and  look  of  an  enraged  Hebrew  prophetess.  From 
Alke's  soul  had  departed  every  thought  of  any  possible 
means  for  Salmani's  escape.  Every  vague  plan  which 
she  had  begun  to  see  afar  off  that  might  reconcile  her 
conscience  with  an  act  which  existed  only  in  remotest 
VOL.  i.  — 19 


29O  MONK  AND  KNIGHT. 

possibility,  every  dim  suggestion  which  rose  out  of  the 
dark  questioning  of  her  mind,  as  to  the  way  in  which  her 
father  and  her  father's  cause  might  be  propitiated,  had 
gone.  All,  save  Alke's  loyalty  to  her  own  heart,  was 
swept  away. 

"  That  manuscript  shall  not  prove  a  grave-cloth  for  my 
honor.  It  is  yours,  Salmani !  I  hasten  for  the  parchment," 
she  at  last  said  to  the  bewildered  man. 

"Stop  !  Virgin  and  beloved —  " 

But  Alke  had  bounded  across  the  brook  which  hitherto 
had  divided  them  from  the  meadow,  which  was  full  of 
anemones  and  wild  campanula,  on  whose  edge  she  now 
stood. 

The  monk  pursued.  "  Oh,  my  angel !  stop  for  but  a 
moment,  and  I  will  not  pursue  you  another  step." 

"  Stand  there  !  Come  not  a  step  nearer  to  me  ! "  said 
the  beautiful  creature,  her  rosy  feet  unshod  and  dew- 
washed,  and  almost  hidden  in  the  grasses  and  blossoms ; 
her  long  hair  floating  with  a  breeze  which  had  sprung  up 
to  bring  orchard  odors  to  their  anguish ;  her  hand  uplifted 
as  if  in  command,  more  lovely  and  more  potent  than  the 
emblazoned  sceptre  of  any  queen;  and  her  face  pale 
with  that  fear  which  accords  with  heroism. 

"  I  see  it  all,"  said  Salmani.  "  You  do  not  love  me 
sufficiently  to  make  you  forget  that  I  have  been  a  novice 
and  am  nearly  a  monk  of  Turin.  I  know  little  of  love, 
but  I  know  that  love  is  not  memory ;  nay,  rather,  love  is 
forgetfulness.  It  is  the  fire  which  consumes  the  unfor- 
tunate past,  and  leaves  bright  and  pure  the  present  and 
future.  But,  Alke,  you  do  not  love  me.  No  !  I  stand 
here  on  these  scaled  rocks,  and  with  the  dull  ground  all 
flowerless  about  me;  you  are  on  the  other  side,  amid 
bloom  and  lingering  dew-drops." 

"Salmani,"  she  said,  "you  belong  to  the  Church  and 
party  of  persecution  and  fables.  I  am  a  Waldensian. 
The  blossom  and  the  dew-fall  are  ours." 


AN  IMPASSABLE  ABYSS.  2QI 

"  Do  not  break  in  upon  my  words  of  love  with  words 
of  religion,"  begged  Salmani.  "  Perhaps  it  is  true,  —  ah  ! 
I  believe  sometimes  that  it  is  most  true,  as  you  say.  But 
forget  not  Salmani !  Alke,  do  not  forget  me  in  your  realm 
of  dew-fall  and  bloom.  As  I  was  saying,  a  tiny  brook, 
over  which  just  now  I  saw  you  leap  in  fear  of  me,  who 
would  not  harm  a  ray  of  that  light  about  your  head,  — 
only  that  slight  stream  divides  us.  Yet  it  is  immeasur- 
ably wide  and  deep,  —  every  drop  *>f  water  in  it  is  an 
abyss  at  present." 

"  Cross  it,  Salmani !  "  said  the  maiden,  in  unconscious 
precipitancy. 

At  once  Salmani's  eye  was  light  itself;  but  as  he  lifted 
his  foot,  Alke  cried  out :  "  Nay ;  I  meant  not  the  stream 
before  your  feet,  but  the  stream  which  divides  our  souls, 
—  the  stream  immeasurably  wide,  whose  every  drop  is  an 
abyss." 

"  I  will  cross  even  that  stream,  if  I  may  go  to  you,  Alke, 
if  I  may  have  you  in  the  dew  and  blossom  of  that  new 
life." 

"  Ah,  Salmani,  come  first  to  the  truth.  If  you  cross 
that  stream  because  love  for  any  woman  leads  you,  you 
will  fall  back.  If  you  cross  it  for  any  human  life,  you 
will  be  lost  in  the  abysses.  If  you  had  crossed  it  for 
truth's  sake,  no  power  could  hurl  you  back.  If  you  try 
to  cross  it  for  God's  sake  alone,  you  will  be  saved." 

"  Oh,  Alke,"  sobbed  the  young  man,  "  I  could  accept 
your  religion  for  my  love's  sake,  but  you  do  not  love 
me.  Some  day  I  may  have  both  love  and  religion  which 
are  full  of  dew  and  bloom." 

"This  little  brook,  full  of  secret  abysses,  divides  us 
yet.  God  give  you  pure  religion,  poor,  proud  monk  ! 
I  know  little  of  love ;  but  I  believe  that  upon  love's 
meadows  the  dew  falls  only  out  of  the  sky  of  the  Infinite 
Love,  and  the  flowers  spring  out  of  an  eternal  affection. 
These  are  the  facts  of  genuine  religion." 


2Q2  MONK  AND  KNIGHT. 

Alke  turned  to  go  away.  Salmani  saw  a  drop  of  liquid 
silver  on  the  cheek  which  glowed  like  a  ruby.  As  he 
turned  to  leave  the  brook- side,  the  maiden,  and  the 
saddest  event  in  his  experience,  he  simply  said,  — 

"  I  will  not  offend  or  rebuke  you.  For  my  sake  and 
my  dead  love's  sake,  keep  the  manuscript.  The  saints 
preserve  you  !  " 

"  God,  who  is  rich  in  mercy,  lead  you,  Salmani,  by  His 
grace  across  the  tiny  but  fathomless  stream  ! "  said  Alke, 
with  a  shaken  voice,  as  they  parted  forever. 

That  night  Aike  received  her  father's  blessing;  and 
Salmani,  who  was  now  wedded  to  a  monastic  life  as 
never  before,  began  a  series  of  painful  penances,  which 
his  spiritual  lord  informed  him  would  probably  make  him 
a  saint,  despite  the  unfortunate  past. 


CHAPTER   XXVII. 

AN    UNCHAINED     BOOK. 
"  Thy  word  giveth  light." 

THERE  is  no  such  pain  leagued  with  such  promise 
as  that  of  a  soul  disturbed  with  a  vitalizing  idea 
larger  than  itself. 

Vian  at  Glastonbury  wandered  to  the  greensward  which 
stretched  away  from  the  abbot's  kitchen  to  the  enclosure. 
There  he  could  hear  the  echoes  of  that  conversation  with 
Giovanni  which  had  left  his  mind  confronted  with  certain 
problems  as  to  the  Scriptures,  which  he  was  now  trying 
to  work  out.  He  possessed  a  New  Testament  only ;  but 
his  reverent  study  of  it  had  charged  his  spirit  with  cer- 
tain notions  as  to  its  future  influence  in  the  world,  such  as 
had  never  occurred  to  his  speculative  mind  before. 

He  now  stood  in  the  long  passage-way,  where  through 
a  gem-like  window  a  soft  autumnal  glow  fell  upon  him 
and  upon  his  book.  He  was  reading  several  passages 
for  his  own  comfort.  It  was  one  of  those  vision-seeing 
hours,  —  one  may  feel  farther  than  one  may  see,  in  their 
radiance,  —  and  they  often  came  to  Vian. 

For  the  first  time  in  his  life,  he  realized  the  signifi- 
cance of  the  open  Bible.  Enshackled  and  restless,  he 
had  already  kissed  it  as  he  had  often  kissed  the  crucifix. 
He  was  chained ;  here  was  the  unchained  Word  of  God. 


294  MONK  AND  KNIGHT. 

Several  copies  of  the  untranslated  Bible  he  had  seen, 
attached  to  posts  of  oak  and  weighted  with  iron  chains. 
This  was  unfettered.  The  very  leaves  looked  like  wings. 
The  fresh  breeze  and  the  broad  world  without  seemed  to 
be  longing  with  a  divine  expectancy.  His  eye  was  filled 
with  a  poetic,  heroic  dream. 

"  That  book,  chainless  and  open,  belongs  to  the  world  ; 
and  the  monk-ridden,  faithless  world  is  begging  to  re- 
ceive it,"  whispered  Vian. 

He  could  not  see  far  into  human  history.  But  his 
quick  instinct  and  fine  penetration  had  enabled  him  to 
apprehend  some  facts,  in  what  he  believed  to  be  the 
destined  course  of  truth-seeking  human  nature.  His 
spiritual  insight  came  upon  many  texts,  hitherto  hidden 
from  the  popular  mind,  which  when  they  should  dawn 
upon  the  aspiring  consciousness  of  circumscribed  human- 
ity, Vian  was  sure  would  produce  political,  religious,  and 
social  revolutions.  With  the  Renaissance  in  his  brain, 
and  that  book  in  his  hand,  Vian  was  standing  at  the 
magnificent  gateway  which  divided  Mediaeval  from  Mod- 
ern Europe.  With  a  sense  of  the  greatness  of  the  mo- 
ment, as  his  finger  followed  the  words  of  some  powerful 
sentence,  his  hand  touched  the  key  which  should  open 
the  portal.  He  was  only  a  poor  and  rebellious  monk ; 
but  he  had  a  vision,  and  visions  are  unaccomplished 
history. 

A  new  race  of  Englishmen  seemed  to  spring  up  and 
become  supreme  as  he  pondered.  "These  texts  will 
transform  nations,"  he  said ;  and  he  could  see  dynasties 
and  thrones  tumbling  down  amid  the  all-comprehending 
change.  His  eye  was  upon  that  passage  which  we  trans- 
late in  the  words,  "Ye  shall  know  the  truth,  and  the 
truth  shall  make  you  free." 

"Free?"  said  this  enslaved  monk.  "Free  by  the 
truth?  That  is  a  conception  of  liberty  which  the  world 
has  known  almost  nothing  about."  He  recalled  the  his- 


AN  UNCHAINED  ROOK.  295 

tory  he  had  learned.  "  Every  inch  of  freedom  which 
has  been  gained  has  been  won  because  the  truth  has 
been  found  out,  and  that  truth  has  become  supreme  over 
it.  Free  by  the  truth?  But  even  the  Fathers  of  the 
Church,  who  were  less  constrained  than  is  our  abbot  about 
interpreting,  —  even  they  make  this  statement  to  apply 
only  to  the  soul's  slavery  unto  sin.  Jesus  Christ,  who  spoke 
it,  was,  methinks,  greater  than  the  Fathers,  —  Jesus!" 
and  he  bowed,  while  his  soul  was  casting  off  manacles. 
"  He  was  replying  to  them  who  said,  <  We  are  of  Abra- 
ham's seed,  and  have  never  been  in  bondage  to  any  man ; ' 
and  he  meant  to  speak  of  an  idea  of  freedom  which  in- 
cluded all  liberty.  Yes ;  all  real  freedom  has  to  be 
achieved.  It  comes  by  the  apprehension  of  truth  and 
the  use  of  it.  Liberty  to  think  is  not  the  concession  of 
the  Pope,  but  one's  personal  affair.  Freedom  for  some 
righteous  action  is  not  to  be  begged,  even  of  some  king ; 
but  it  is  something  to  be  won  by  first  winning  the  truth 
of  which  the  action  is  the  result." 

"  You  are  wandering  in  a  perilous  path,"  said  some 
one  behind  him;  and  strong  hands  held  him,  so  that 
Vian  could  not  see  the  interlocutor,  who  spoke  with  pre- 
cisely the  tones  which  the  abbot  used  on  all  serious  occa- 
sions. "  Vian,  you  are  not  far  from  the  kingdom  of 
Satan,"  added  the  speaker,  who  evidently  had  overheard 
Vian's  excited  musings. 

Could  it  be  that  Abbot  Richard  was  thus  made  cogni- 
zant of  the  secret  that  more  of  intellectual  and  spiritual 
dawn  was  stealing  over  the  mind  of  the  young  monk  ? 
Vian  had  spoken  audibly,  he  knew  not  how  much ; 
enough,  as  he  thought,  to  exile  him  forever  from  the 
abbot's  love.  To  have  heard  this  much  of  religious  and 
political  heresy  from  Vian  would  break  the  heart  of  Abbot 
Richard  Beere,  —  that  Vian  knew. 

"  Oh,  Timothy,"  pleaded  this  voice,  assuming  profess- 
edly Pauline  tones  in  uttering  that  pregnant  sadness 


296  MONK  AND  KNIGHT. 

which  seeks  the  preventive  after  the  mischief  is  done,' 
"  Timothy,  shun  profane  babblings  !  " 

Vian  made  a  desperate  effort  to  turn  himself  about. 
He  must  see  the  anguish-wrinkled  face  of  the  holy  man, 
Richard  Beere.  The  sudden  movement  freed  him,  and 
he  looked  around  only  to  gaze  penitently  into  the  laugh- 
ing countenance  of  the  sly  old  Fra  Giovanni,  who  grinned 
in  triumph  and  said,  — 

"  Did  you  think  that  the  Devil  or  Abbot  Richard  had 
you,  Vian?" 

"Both,"  was  the  answer,  as  Vian  sighed  his  relief. 

Vian  had  been  thoroughly  frightened,  and  was  half 
ashamed  of  himself.  To  lose  the  memory  of  it  and  to 
assure  himself,  he  launched  out  into  the  deep  still  more 
freely.  He  could  trust  the  humorous  Giovanni,  to  whom 
everything  in  the  abbey  was  absurd  and  laughable,  except 
"  the  new  learning  "  and  the  stirrings  of  reform  in  such 
as  Vian. 

"  The  whole  constabulary  of  the  Church,  instructed  to 
keep  freedom,  to  do  police  duty  for  liberty,  —  it  is  an 
abomination,  if  it  be  true  that  truth  is  the  source  of 
freedom.  It  needs  only  that  men  be  true  to  God,  to 
themselves,  and  to  the  truth." 

"  Perilous  times  are  these,"  said  Giovanni,  with  a  smile. 

"  It  is  perilous  to  think,  especially  when  the  mind  has 
been  used  to  have  an  institution  do  one's  thinking  for  it. 
But  I  am  serious.  If  this  Bible  ever  gets  out  into 
the  world,  the  revolution  of  which  you  have  told  me, 
which  has  been  produced  in  Italy  and  Europe  by  Greek 
and  Roman  letters,  will  be  eclipsed  by  a  more  mighty 
revolution." 

"  Yes,"  said  the  older  monk,  with  unwonted  solemnity, 
"  Italy  has  had  a  renaissance,  as  the  French  say ;  and  its 
straying  energies  have  entered  England.  That  was  all 
that  Greece  and  Rome  could  do,  — just  to  reach  the  brain 
of  Europe.  This  book,"  — and  the  old  wit  put  his  hand 


AN  UNCHAINED  BOOK.  297 

upon  it,  —  "  this  book  will  reach  brain,  heart,  and  con- 
science. It  will  bring  a  reformation.  That  reformation 
will  not  stop  to  advise  with  Abbot  Richard,  or  to  consult 
with  my  old  friend  Leo  X.,  —  the  gods  be  pitiful  to  his 
Holiness  !  You  will  live  to  see  this.  Mind  you,  Vian  ! 
do  not  get  your  own  head  knocked  in  by  standing  too 
near  when  the  timbers  begin  to  fall." 

Vian  never  saw  Giovanni  so  solemn  before.  He  won- 
dered, as  the  old  monk  toddled  a^vay  like  a  child,  if 
Giovanni  might  not  have  been  a  great  Church  Father  in 
some  other  life,  and  by  sin  have  fallen  into  being  a  sort 
of  ecclesiastical  court-fool,  who  had  some  moments  in 
which  his  pristine  mental  energy  manifested  itself.  For 
Vian  was  already  a  believer  in  the  transmigration  of  the 
soul. 

"There  !  I  must  go,"  added  Giovanni  to  the  eloquent 
silence. 

"  Farewell,  Fra  Giovanni  !  "  said  Vian,  forgetful  that 
in  such  moods  the  old  monk  took  every  chance  to  poke 
fun  at  the  affectations  of  the  Renaissance. 

"  Nay ;  say  not  '  Giovanni,'  —  that  is  unclassical ;  '  Jo- 
vianus,'  Vianus  !  "  Humor  had  again  lit  her  flickering 
lights  in  the  old  man's  eyes,  which  left  Vian  amused. 

But  the  young  monk  turned  the  leaves  again,  until  he 
came  to  the  remark  of  John  the  Baptist  in  reply  to  those 
who  boasted  to  him  of  Abrahamic  ancestry.  The  signifi- 
cance of  that  reply  fell  upon  the  soul  of  Vian  like  a  dis- 
tinct revelation  :  "  God  out  of  these  stones  can  raise  up 
children  unto  Abraham." 

Vian  was  no  professional  statesman,  but  he  could  see 
even  the  best  of  aristocracies  crumble  before  the  breath 
of  that  idea.  "  That,"  said  he,  "  was  the  idea  of  aris- 
tocracy which  gave  Greece  dreams  of  democracy."  He 
had  read  the  concluding  words  of  the  "  Republic  "  of 
Plato  with  Erasmus  himself,  when  he  waited  with  the 
sub-prior  at  Cambridge,  —  "  That  idea  was  in  the  mind 


298  MONK  AND  KNIGHT. 

of  Savonarola  at  Florence.  Curses  upon  a  church  which 
burns  such  a  prophet !  " 

Giovanni  had  ambled  back  again.  His  activity  had  in- 
creased his  wheeziness,  and  he  complained  of  rheumatic 
pain ;  but  with  a  clear  understanding  of  Vian's  situation, 
he  said :  "  Brother  Vian,  when  that  book  is  free  every- 
where, this  will  be  a  new  world.  There  will  be  no  abbey, 
no  monk ;  "  and  he  trudged  on  as  he  added  :  "  I  have 
heard  this  day  from  the  statue.  We  will  have  the  sight 
of  a  bit  of  Athens,  a  fragment  of  the  age  of  Praxiteles, 
right  here  in  Glastonbury." 

It  seemed  strange  to  Vian,  as  the  Italian  monk  went 
away,  that  ancient  Greece  should  come  into  England  by 
way  of  Fra  Giovanni ;  but  more  wonderful  than  Greece 
to  him,  was  the  fact  that  a  story  like  this  of  the  Christ  in 
his  New  Testament,  to  whose  truth  he  clung  in  spite  of 
his  passionate  attachment  to  the  doctrine  of  the  trans- 
migration of  souls,  should  just  now  be  coming  again  to 
light,  in  spite  of  priests  and  crowned  heads. 

He  opened  again,  and  his  eye  fell  upon  the  words : 
"  Whosoever  will  be  chief  among  you,  let  him  be  your 
servant." 

Oh,  if  Vian  had  known  the  persons  whom  he  seemed 
to  see  in  the  future  !  It  was  one  of  those  moments  of 
prophecy,  — "  the  testimony  of  Jesus  is  the  spirit  of 
prophecy,"  —  and  Vian  saw  republics  rise  on  the  ruins 
of  tyrannies,  and  democracies  replace  dynasties. 

"  That  idea  will  overturn  and  overturn,  until  no  king 
shall  be  able  to  sit  upon  his  throne,  except  as  the  voice 
of  his  people  shall  call  him  '  servant  of  all.'  '  My  Liege 
Lord '  will  have  to  be  a  minister  of  freedom  and  right- 
eousness, or  abdicate.  Just  as  surely  as  this  King  of 
Kings  and  Lord  of  Lords — Jesus  of  Nazareth — finds 
the  human  brain,  over  the  ruins  of  all  our  jewelled  crosses 
and  the  hideous  tyrannies  in  Church  and  kingdom,  men 
will  see  that  all  real  kingship  is  holy  service  to  human- 


AN  UNCHAINED  BOOK.  299 

ity.  All  authority  is  righteously  granted  only  to  a  mon- 
arch or  to  an  institution  which  executes  the  will  of  God 
in  serving  His  purpose ;  and  His  purpose  is  to  conform 
mankind,  by  the  power  of  truth  and  goodness,  into 
the  image  of  His  dear  Son.  That  is  all  there  is  of 
'  the  divine  right  of  kings ; '  and  that  is  all  there  is 
of  '  the  authority  of  the  Pope.'  " 

Vian's  eyes  were  lucent  with  these  ideas,  as  he  turned 
to  hear  footsteps  again.  They  were  the  footsteps  of  a 
friend.  Old  Giovanni  began  again,  on  his  return,  to 
eavesdrop ;  and  while  his  heart  was  stirred  with  Vian's 
prophecy,  he  was  so  bent  on  sport  with  the  brothers 
who  affected  admiration  for  Greek  art,  that  he  said,  — 

"  Brother  Vian,  let  us  flee  to  the  majestic  past.  Bother 
the  future  no  more.  I  am  about  ready  to  take  the  holy 
brethren  "  —  and  Giovanni  crossed  himself —  "  to  see  a 
fragment  of  the  Athens  of  Pericles." 

"  What  was  Athens  to  the  New  Jerusalem  of  an  un- 
fettered human  society?  What  is  Pericles  in  comparison 
with  the  true  prince  who  shall  govern  by  the  loyal  agree- 
ment and  by  the  desire  of  those  whom  he  rules,  govern- 
ing them  because  he  has  '  the  divine  right  '  which  lies  in 
his  generous  aims  and  wise  counsels  and  uplifting  hopes 
for  all  men.  Goodness  has  the  right  to  be  sovereign,  — 
that  is  all  there  is  of  this  '  divine  right  of  kings.'  What 
is  the  past  but  a  path  to  the  future?" 

"You  are  eloquent  enough  to  please  a  Mirandola," 
said  Giovanni,  with  a  sneer  not  altogether  critical. 

"  Get  me  a  chance  to  go  from  my  Ferrara  to  some 
Florence,"  replied  Vian,  "  as  Mirandola  obtained  it  for 
Savonarola,  and  I  also  will  make  a  Lorenzo  tremble." 

"  You  will  soon  have  the  chance  to  leave  this  abbey, 
Vian ;  but  do  not  turn  reformer  until  you  see  my  statue 
which  was  found  near  the  Temple  of  Jupiter,"  interposed 
the  old  monk.  "  Perilous  times,  as  Abbot  Richard  says, 
are  these." 


3OO  MONK  AND  KNIGHT. 

The  more  Vian  thought  of  the  statue,  for  a  sight  of 
which  the  band  of  monks  in  Glastonbury  sympathizing 
with  the  Greek  ideal  had  longed,  the  more  he  felt  the 
significance  of  the  future.  How  could  the  human  soul 
have  entertained  such  dreams  of  beauty  as  revealed  them- 
selves in  Greek  art,  if  the  soul  had  not  possessed  such 
native  sonship  unto  God,  such  a  supreme  right  to  de- 
velop its  own  energies,  such  an  inalienable  hold  upon  the 
divine  will,  as  no  bishop  or  crown  could  frustrate  ?  The 
Renaissance  had  come,  to  make  any  kind  of  interference 
with  the  soul's  highest  possibility  seem  a  wicked  intrusion. 
How  much  lay  before  the  human  spirit,  —  how  much  in 
the  higher,  more  complex  arts  of  government,  of  charac- 
ter-making, of  redeeming  the  material  world  and  training 
all  its  powers  into  the  service  of  man,  to  the  glory  of 
God,  his  Father  !  It  began  to  come  in  sight  like  a  gor- 
geous revelation,  as  Vian  thought  of  the  emancipation 
from  hypocrisy,  priestcraft,  and  kingcraft  which  an  open 
Bible  was  sure  to  accomplish,  and  the  omnipotent  impulse 
toward  healthful  individual  growth  which  its  teachings 
would  inspire. 

"Oh  !  "  said  he  to  Giovanni,  who  had  taken  part  in 
the  famous  controversy  between  the  so-called  "  Greeks  " 
and  "  Trojans,"  "  get  the  *  Greeks '  to  view  the  statue. 
I  am  on  fire  with  these  ideas." 

"  You  will  consume  away." 

"  No ;  these  are  the  fires  with  which  the  bush  of 
Moses  burned,  but  it  did  not  consume  away." 

"  Your  interpretations  of  Scripture  are  so  bold  and 
free  that  I  want  you  to  interpret  my  statue.  Come, 
Vian,  it  is  only  another  kind  of  Scripture,  as  was  all 
the  art  of  Greece,  —  psalms  in  stone,  an  exodus 
of  the  imagination,  a  conquest  of  an  intellectual  and 
spiritual  Canaan,  through  chiselling  of  rock.  Come, 
Vian  ! " 

"  Fra  Giovanni !  " 


AN  UNCHAINED  BOOK.  30 1 

"  ( Jovianus,'  please  you,  Vianus  !  "  broke  in  the  cham- 
pion of  the  Renaissance. 

"  If  I  may,  I  will  be  classical,"  said  Vian;  "but  these 
ideas  are  a  revelation  to  me.  They  are  disastrous  to 
much  that  I  have  been  taught.  They  burn  with  furious 
heat ;  but  surely  they  have  burned  in  the  soul  of  man  for 
many  ages,  and  they  have  not  consumed  it." 

"  Not  since  the  days  of  the  good  Pope  Sylvester,  after 
which  the  Holy  Church  became  the  ^dictator  of  govern- 
ment and  a  tyrant  over  the  mind,  trying  to  do  something  in 
her  ambitious  greed  of  power,  —  something  which,  by  the 
way,  must  always  be  accomplished  by  the  abandonment 
of  visible  power,  —  not  since  Constantine,  has  the  fire  of 
which  you  speak  burned  in  Christendom  as  I  have  seen 
it  burn  in  your  brain  to-day,  Vian  !  " 

"  He  who  would  be  chief,  let  him  be  the  servant  of  all," 
answered  the  young  man. 

"That,"  urged  Giovanni,  "the  papacy  has  forgotten 
ages  ago.  The  Pope  has  been  the  servant  of  nobody,  not 
even  of  God  Himself.  The  fact  is  that  the  papacy  has 
become  so  huge  that  it  has  cast  a  shadow  even  upon  the 
throne  of  the  Omnipotent,  and  obscured  it.  No ;  the 
Pope  has  been  nobody's  servant,  but  he  has  made  men 
his  slaves.  Let  that  idea  burn  in  your  soul,  Vian;  it 
shall  not  consume  away." 

"Men  holier  than  the  popes  really  believe  that  the 
burning  bush  is  already  within  the  sight  of  men,"  said 
Vian,  with  seriousness.  "  Sometimes  I  hear  the  name 
of  one  who  is  thought  to  be  this  new  Moses." 

"You  remember  the  letters  of  Wycliffe  to  your 
ancestor?  " 

"  Yes ;  I  was  thinking  about  that  bush  which  burned 
and  was  not  consumed  away.  That  burning  bush  is  to 
be  seen  in  all  history.  I  feel  the  heat  of  it.  Oh,  my 
old  friend,  can  it  be  true?" 

"  Come,  Vian,  your  mind  needs  to  feast  itself,  not  with 


302  MONK  AND  KNIGHT. 

rough,  strong  food,  but  with  refined  and  delicious  viands. 
These  Greece  prepared  for  the  human  soul.  Let  us  get 
the  '  Greeks '  of  Glastonbury  together,  and  inspect  the 
statue,"  said  Giovanni. 

"  Not  Pericles  now,  but  rather  an  obscure  German 
monk  fills  my  mind  with  wonder.  Shall  I  admire  him  ? 
No,  Giovanni ;  not  Pericles  at  Athens,  but  —  " 

"  Ha  !  let  me  say  it.  I  understand  you,  Vian.  Not 
Pericles  at  Athens,"  —  the  old  monk,  breathing  with  diffi- 
culty, crept  close  and  whispered,  as  his  eye  blazed,  —  "  but 
the  monk  Martin  Luther  affixing  his  theses  on  the  great 
door,  —  this  is  the  man  and  that  is  the  scene  which 
your  soul  beholds.  Vian,  there  is  your  new  Moses  !  " 

"  And  there,"  said  Vian,  "  though  I  cannot  like  Luther, 
—  but  there  may  be  the  burning  bush.  I  know  that  his 
Holiness  says  that  it  is  but  a  squabble  of  monks,  a  noisy 
little  row  about  the  sacraments ;  but  mayhap  that  blus- 
tering German  monk  has  furnished  another  burning  bush. 
Erasmus  does  not  like  it,  —  /  cannot  like  the  German 
monk  !  —  but  what  if  that  bush  burns  and  does  not  con- 
sume away?" 

"  You  begin  to  respect  your  father  at  Lutterworth," 
said  Giovanni. 

"  I  begin  to  think  much  of  the  letters  of  Wycliffe 
which  I  believe  Abbot  Richard  has  burned  up.  There 
was  a  great  spiritual  fortune  in  that  chest ;  and  the  ab- 
bot could  not  burn  my  inheritance.  Wycliffe  also  was  a 
Moses.  The  intellectual  ancestry  of  the  German  monk, 
even  if  he  is  a  coarse,  boisterous,  and  unruly  fellow,  is 
illustrious." 

"  Most  of  his  ancestors  saw  the  burning  of  the  bush," 
said  Giovanni. 

"  All  of  them  saw  it.  It  has  never  been  quite  out  of 
sight,"  added  Vian.  "  When  Saint  Francis  organized  his 
band  of  brothers  who  opposed  avarice,  to  follow  their 
Lord  into  poverty ;  when  Thomas  a  Kempis  ignored  the 


AN  UNCHAINED  BOOK.  303 

pomp  of  men  and  preached  the  love  of  God  ;  when  Flor- 
entius  honored  only  purity  and  attacked  corruption; 
when  John  Wycliffe  —  " 

Vian's  utterance  gave  way  to  emotion  as  he  thought  of 
his  father,  but  he  saw  in  the  lives  he  had  mentioned  the 
glorious  flame. 

"  Vian,  my  brother,  —  Vianus,  I  should  say,  —  these  are 
perilous  times.  I  hate  the  Germans.  I  like  the  calm  tem- 
per and  quiet  power  of  Master  Erasmus;  but  even  in 
Rotterdam  they  are  now  saying  that  Erasmus  laid  the 
egg  and  this  monk,  Martin,  has  hatched  it ;  and  they 
speak  truthfully,  Vianus.  Now  for  the  statue  and  the 
Greek  critics  !  Ahem  !  Let  us  go.  Do  not  stand  by 
these  unchained  Scriptures  too  long,  or  you  will  be  a 
heretic." 

Giovanni  laughed  as  he  spoke,  for  he  had  a  conviction 
that  the  heretic  had  already  come. 


CHAPTER   XXVIII. 

AN   UNCHAINED    BOOK. 
"  And  on  his  head  were  many  crowns." 

VI AN,  as  we  have  seen,  had  greatly  admired  what 
appeared  to  be  the  judicial  poise  and  solid  good 
sense  of  Erasmus.  The  truth  was  that  Vian  had  been 
begotten  anew  intellectually,  by  the  scholar  of  Rotterdam  ; 
and  his  gratitude  blossomed  in  imitative  affection.  It  was 
only  through  severe  self-discipline,  however,  that  now  the 
young  monk  could  wring  from  his  nature  and  experience 
a  single  Erasmian  sentiment.  Vian  was  full  of  blood  and 
fire  ;  Erasmus  was  bloodless  and  cold.  '  Vian  tried  to 
follow,  though  with  difficulty.  It  was  the  fury  of  the  flame 
admiring  the  crystalline  opalescence  of  the  ice -clad  cliff. 
Still  he  confessed  the  charm.  In  spite  of  the  fact  that 
ice  covered  the  summit,  the  red  glory  of  morning  had 
hung  upon  it  until  it  blazed  like  an  exalted  beacon. 
Vian  had  found  in  youth  the  deepest  love  for  one  whose 
restful  strength  grew  venerable  as  age  came  on.  His 
very  lively  suspicion  that  he  might  be  led  to  admire 
Luther  did  not  becloud  his  conviction  that  if  the  reform 
must  come,  it  ought  to  come  and  would  come  through 
culture  rather  than  anarchy.  Erasmus  —  such  had  been 
Vian's  sober  opinion  —  must  be  its  leader ;  not  the  tur- 
bulent monk  of  Erfurt.  The  serenity  of  Dr.  John  Colet, 


AN  UNCHAINED  BOOK.  305 

as  he  had  founded  St.  Paul's  School  in  London,  preach- 
ing reform  and  "  the  new  learning "  at  Oxford,  and 
mingling  his  own  fine  sentiments  with  the  glowing  elo- 
quence of  Thomas  More,  had  often  made  him  think  of 
that  text :  "  The  kingdom  of  God  cometh  not  with 
observation."  Vian  was  astonished  and  chagrined  at  his 
own  crude  dogmatism,  when  he  remembered  the  frenzy  of 
his  utterances  to  Giovanni  concerning  the  violent  change 
to  come. 

What  could  Erasmus  think  of  Luther's  theses?  What 
would  More  and  Colet  have  to  say  about  him  who  had 
already  roused  Germany  on  the  sale  of  indulgences? 
Vian  was  hesitating  again  in  the  presence  of  revered 
names. 

The  reaction  from  such  strong  convictions  as  had  as- 
serted themselves  in  his  soul  had  come.  Vian  had  well- 
nigh  expended  his  strength  in  utterance.  When  would 
Giovanni  come  to  take  him  to  see  the  fragment  of  Greek 
art  ?  He  laughed  when  he  thought  of  it,  and  then  was 
very  sober,  because,  while,  as  he  believed,  the  sly  old 
monk  had  played  and  would  play  all  manner  of  pranks 
upon  the  Glastonbury  "  Greeks,"  he  did  not  fancy  that  at 
this  time  Fra  Giovanni  was  meaning  to  prove  to  these 
persons  who  affected  interest  and  intelligence  with  respect 
to  Greek  art,  that  they  really  knew  nothing  about  it. 

He  yet  had  in  mind  the  text,  "  The  kingdom  of  God 
cometh  not  with  observation."  He  could  not  forget  how 
diversely  he  had  spoken  of  that  German  monk  who  had 
offended  all  Erasmian  theories  with  his  noise  about  the 
indulgences,  but  who,  nevertheless,  by  his  impulsiveness 
and  humanity  had  attracted  Vian's  warm  heart.  He 
sought  the  open  Scripture,  and  his  eye  fell  upon  the  words, 
"  One  is  your  master,  even  Christ ;  "  and  "'Henceforth  let 
no  man  trouble  me,  for  I  bear  in  my  body  the  marks  of 
the  Lord  Jesus." 

These   brought  to  his  mind  the  Wycliffe  letters,  the 

VOL.  I.  —  20 


306  MONK  AND  KNIGHT. 

heroism  of  his  ancestors  at  Lutterworth,  and  the  faces  of 
courageous  Lollards.  "These  burned  letters  constantly 
asserted  that  idea,"  said  Vian.  For  that  the  Lollard 
had  stood ;  and  with  that  his  cause,  burning  with  furious 
flame,  had  illumined  Europe,  but  had  not  consumed 
away. 

Again  did  that  open  Bible  appear  to  be  an  armory 
filled  with  weapons  with  which  abuses  and  wrongs  were 
to  be  beaten  down. 

"Surely  no  one  in  Wycliffe's  day  thought  that  the 
kingdom  of  heaven  was  coming  by  way  of  his  pulpit; 
but,"  added  Vian,  "  it  may  be  that  Erasmus  is  wrong, 
and  that  exactly  what  is  unobserved  power  in  the  Ger- 
man monk  will  win  the  day  for  a  less  rugged  and  more 
pacific  solution  of  the  problem." 

Vian  had  learned  how  the  texts  of  an  open  Bible 
might  be  misapplied.  But  he  could  risk  the  power 
within  the  book,  within  the  soul  of  man,  to  enforce  the 
divine  utterances. 

The  Church  Fathers  appeared  at  once  greater  and 
smaller  than  before  to  this  scholarly  young  monk.  They 
were  greater  than  his  contemporaries,  because  they  had 
stood  in  nearer  sympathy  with  these  unencumbered 
words ;  smaller  than  the  apostles  and  prophets,  because 
even  they  dared  not  risk  the  fresh  and  revolutionary 
truth. 

Luther  the  monk  had  already  gone  so  far  as  to  insist 
that  this  unchained  book  should  be  the  book  of  the 
people.  Vian  felt  the  inrushing  day  break  over  Europe. 
It  was  but  an  instant  of  dawn  which  he  saw,  —  a  flush 
in  the  sky,  a  gray  streak  with  stray  beams  of  gold  and 
purple,  flashing  hints  of  oncoming  noontide.  Such  mo- 
ments were  visiting  many  souls  at  that  juncture.  Every 
gleam  was  prophetic.  None  could  utter  it ;  only  sensitive 
spirits  could  feel  it.  The  open  Bible,  —  a  new  Europe  ! 

He  thought  of  Giovanni's  coming  to  ask  him  again  to 


AN  UNCHAINED  BOOK.  307 

view  the  statue  which  the  old  classicist  insisted  he  had 
obtained  of  a  Greek  sailor  shipwrecked  near. 

"Here,"  said  Vian,  as  he  turned  to  his  New  Testament, 
and  remembered  how  every  stormy  moment  of  expe- 
rience and  every  hour  of  quiet  meditation  had  gone  into 
the  very  texture  of  the  Greek  language,  —  "  here  is  9*me- 
thing  within  Aristotle's  language  more  philosophical  than 
he.  Here  the  glory  of  the  tabernacle  of  the  Jew"  shines' 
through  the  Parthenon  of  the  Greek.  •  Here  combine  the 
two  streams  which  have  borne  the  greatest  argosies  of 
humanity,  —  those  of  head  and  heart.  Let  Giovanni 
grow  frantic  with  rejoicing  that  he  has  secured  of  some 
hapless  sailor  a  fragment  of  the  Athens  of  Pericles  !  -  ••  I 
will  tell  him  that  Athens  was  never  so  great  as  when 
Saint  Paul  looked  around  upon  the  dissolving  civili- 
zation of  Pericles,  and  made  Greek  culture  glow  with 
Christian  significance.  But  I  am  a  heretic;  and  I  am 
drifting  even  from  the  Fathers  of  the  Church,  as  I  have 
long  since  drifted  from  Abbot  Richard.  Shall  I  pray? 
Nay ;  for  I  am  not  so  far  astray  as  was  Saint  Augustine. 
He  said,  '  Plato  showed  me  the  true  God ;  Jesus  Christ 
showed  me  the  way  to  Him.'  I  have  not  drifted  so 
far." 

Poor,  perplexed  Vian,  —  a  Christian  amid  the  dazzling 
lights  and  deep  shadows  of  the  Renaissance,  —  a  monk, 
a  heretic,  a  Pythagorean  ! 

Then  he  touched  the  volume  again,  as  a  sick  man 
takes  hold  of  a  battery.  "  Oh,  surely  there  is  promise 
in  this  freed  book !  The  Greek  language  waited  to 
carry  the  new  Iliad  into  the  human  soul." 

Why  did  not  Giovanni  come?  Vian  thought  little 
about  him  or  classic  Greece.  On  the  ruins  of  classi- 
calism  he  saw  a  new  power  .rising.  By  and  by  it  would 
be  seen  to  include  the  prophetic  energies  of  olden 
times.  He  could  see  distinctly  but  two  things,  —  an 
open  Bible  and  a  new  Europe. 


308  MONK  AND  KNIGHT. 

How  true  was  this  vague,  prophetic  feeling  !  That 
new  Europe  was  very  near,  and  stretched  afar.  With 
this  book  as  inspiration  and  resource,  William  Tyndale 
and  Miles  Coverdale  were  so  to  continue  and  complete 
the  task  of  the  Venerable  Bede  and  John  Wycliffe  as  to 
mark  an  epoch  in  the  history  of  that  language  to  be  used 
by  Shakspeare  and  Burke,  —  an  era  as  distinct  as  that 
which  Luther's  Bible  so  soon  should  mark  in  the  history 
of  a  language  to  be  such  a  potent  instrument  in  the 
hands  of  Goethe  and  Hegel.  For  this  very  act  of  heresy, 
Tyndale  was  to  be  called  "a  full-grown  Wycliffe,"  and 
Luther  "the  redeemer  of  his  mother-tongue."  With 
the  Bible  Calvin  was  to  conceive  republics  at  Geneva, 
and  Holbein  to  paint,  in  spite  of  the  iconoclasm  of  the 
Reformation,  the  faces  of  Holy  Mother  and  Saint,  and 
in  spite  of  the  cruelty  of  the  Church,  scripturally  con- 
ceived satires  illustrating  the  sale  of  indulgences.  With 
that  book  Gustavus  Vasa  was  to  protect  and  nurture  the 
freedom  of  that  land  of  flowing  splendors,  while  Angelo 
was  transcribing  sacred  scenes  upon  the  Sistine  Vault  or 
fixing  them  in  stone.  Reading  this  book,  More  was  to 
die  with  a  smile  ;  Latimer,  Cranmer,  and  Ridley  to  perish 
while  illuminating  Europe  with  living  torches,  and  the 
Anabaptist  to  arouse  the  sympathies  of  Christendom  by 
his  agonies.  With  this  book  in  hand,  Shakspeare  was 
to  write  his  plays;  Raleigh  to  die,  knight,  discoverer, 
thinker,  statesman,  martyr ;  Bacon  to  lay  the  foundation 
of  modern  scientific  research,  —  three  stars  in  the  majes- 
tic constellation  about  Henry's  daughter.  With  this  Bible 
open  before  them,  the  English  nation  would  behold  the 
Spanish  Armada  dashed  to  pieces  upon  the  rocks,  while 
Edmund  Spenser  mingled  his  delicious  notes  with  the 
tumult  of  that  awful  wreck. 

This  book  was  to  produce  the  Edict  of  Nantes,  while 
John  of  Barneveldt  would  give  new  life  to  the  command 
of  William  the  Silent,  —  "  Level  the  dikes  ;  give  Holland 


AN  UNCHAINED  BOOK.  309 

back  to  the  ocean,  if  need  be,"  thus  making  preparation 
for  the  visit  of  the  Mayflower  Pilgrims  to  Leyden  or 
Delfthaven.  Their  eyes  resting  upon  its  pages,  Selden 
and  Pym  were  to  go  to  prison,  while  Grotius  dreamed  of 
the  rights  of  man  in  peace  and  war,  and  Guido  and 
Rubens  were  painting  the  joys  of  the  manger  or  the 
sorrows  of  Calvary.  His  hand  resting  upon  this  book, 
Oliver  Cromwell  would  consolidate  the  hopes  and  con- 
victions of  Puritanism  into  a  sword  which  should  conquer 
at  Naseby,  Marston  Moor,  and  Dunbar,  leave  to  the 
throne  of  Charles  I.  a  headless  corse,  and  create,  if  only 
for  an  hour's  prophecy,  a  Commonwealth  of  unbending 
righteousness.  With  that  volume  in  their  homes,  the 
Swede  and  the  Huguenot,  the  Scotch-Irishman  and  the 
Quaker,  the  Dutchman  and  the  freedom-loving  Catholic 
were  to  plan  pilgrimages  to  the  West,  and  establish  new 
homes  in  America.  With  that  book  in  the  cabin  of 
the  "  Mayflower,"  venerated  and  obeyed  by  sea-tossed 
exiles,  was  to  be  born  a  compact  from  which  should 
spring  a  constitution  and  a  government  for  the  life  of 
which  all  these  nationalities  should  willingly  bleed  and 
struggle,  under  a  commander  who  should  rise  from  the 
soil  of  the  Cavaliers,  and  unsheath  his  sword  in  the 
colony  of  the  Puritans. 

Out  of  that  Bible  was  to  come  the  Petition  of  Right, 
the  National  Anthem  of  1628,  the  Great  Remonstrance, 
and  Paradise  Lost.  With  it  Blake  and  Pascal  should 
voyage  heroically  in  diverse  seas.  In  its  influence,  Har- 
rington should  write  his  "  Oceana,"  Jeremy  Taylor  his 
"  Liberty  of  Prophesying,"  Sir  Matthew  Hale  his  fearless 
replies,  while  Rembrandt  was  placing  on  canvas  little 
Dutch  children,  with  wooden  shoes,  crowding  to  the  feet 
of  a  Jewish  Messiah. 

Its  lines,  breathing  life,  order,  and  freedom,  would 
inspire  John  Bunyan's  dream,  Algernon  Sidney's  fatal 
republicanism,  and  Puffendorf  s  judicature.  With  them 


3IO  MONK  AND  KNIGHT. 

William  Penn  would  meet  the  Indian  of  the  forest,  and 
Fenelon  the  philosopher  in  his  meditative  solitude.  Locke 
and  Newton  and  Leibnitz  would  carry  it  with  them  in 
pathless  fields  of  speculation,  while  Peter  the  Great  was 
smiting  an  arrogant  priest  in  Russia,  and  William  was 
ascending  the  English  throne.  From  its  poetry  Cowper, 
Wordsworth,  Tennyson,  and  Browning  would  catch  the 
divine  afflatus;  from  its  statesmanship  Burke,  Romilly, 
and  Bright  would  learn  how  to  create  and  redeem  insti- 
tutions ;  from  its  melodies  Handel,  Bach,  Mendelssohn, 
and  Beethoven  would  write  oratorios,  masses,  and  sym- 
phonies ;  from  its  declarations  of  divine  sympathy  Wil- 
berforce,  Howard,  and  Florence  Nightingale  were  to 
emancipate  slaves,  reform  prisons,  and  mitigate  the  cru- 
elties of  war;  from  its  prophecies  Dante's  hope  of  a 
united  Italy  was  to  be  realized  by  Cavour,  Garibaldi,  and 
Victor  Emmanuel ;  and  with  her  hand  upon  that  book 
Victoria,  England's  coming  queen,  was  to  sum  up  her 
history  as  a  power  amid  the  nations  of  the  earth,  when, 
replying  to  the  question  of  an  ambassador,  "What  is 
the  secret  of  England's  superiority  among  the  nations?  " 
she  would  say,  "  Go  tell  your  prince  that  this  is  the 
secret  of  England's  political  greatness.'* 
Vian  could  not  see,  but  he  felt,  the  future. 


CHAPTER   XXIX. 

VIAN   THE   PYTHAGOREAN. 

Beware  of  Greek,  lest  you  become  a  heretic      Fly  from  Hebrew,  lest  you 
become  like  Jews.  —  Sixteenth  Century  Proverb. 

Somewhere,  —  in  desolate  wind-swept  space,  — 

In  twilight-land,  —  in  no  man's  land, 
Two  hurrying  shapes  met  face  to  face, 

And  bade  each  other  stand. 

"  And  who  are  you  ? "  cried  one  agape, 

Shuddering  in  the  gloaming  light. 
"  I  know  not,"  said  the  other  shape  ; 

"  I  only  died  last  night." 

ALDRICH. 

WHILE  in  1518  Raphael's  unfinished  masterpiece 
"  The  Transfiguration  "  was  being  borne  along 
toward  his  grave  by  the  mourning  city  of  Rome,  and 
Ami  in  France  was  beseeching  Francis  I.  to  deal  wisely 
with  the  deputations  of  Parliament  which  came  to  Am- 
boise  to  pray  for  the  abolition  of  the  Concordat,  our  dis- 
quieted monk  in  England  was  becoming  more  sure  that 
the  Almighty,  if  He  had  any  serious  intentions  whatever 
concerning  a  soul  which  seemed  doomed  to  be  tempest- 
tossed,  did  not  intend  him  to  do  Him  service  as  an  ec- 
clesiastic at  Glastonbury. 

The  hour  had  at  last  come  when  the  abbot  was  will- 
ing to  avow  that  he  himself  was  thoroughly  discouraged 


312  MONK  AND  KNIGHT. 

with  Vian.  "  He  will  never  be  Abbot  of  Glastonbury ; 
he  is  not  even  an  obedient  monk,"  said  he,  regretfully. 
"  I  will,  however,  make  one  more  effort  to  convince 
him." 

In  a  brief  hour  one  of  the  priors  had  seen  Vian  read- 
ing the  words  of  Knighton,  Wycliffe's  antagonist. 

"  He  was  reading  Master  Knighton ;  and  great  was 
his  attention  to  the  wisdom  of  his  words,"  said  the  prior, 
who  always  comforted  the  abbot  with  the  most  favorable 
view  of  any  event. 

"  We  have  lost  our  pearl,  as  I  fear,  —  our  pearl  is  lost. 
Evil  days  are  these  !  "  and  the  abbot  groaned  with  pain, 
as  he  pressed  his  heart. 

These  are  the  words  which  Vian  read  again  and  again  : 
"  The  Scripture  was  given  only  to  the  clergy  and  doc- 
tors of  the  Church,  that  they  might  administer  to  laity 
and  to  weaker  persons,  according  to  the  state  of  the 
times  and  the  wants  of  man.  But  this  Master  John 
Wycliffe  translated  it  out  of  Latin  into  the  tongue  An- 
glican —  not  Angelic  !  Thus  it  became  of  itself  more 
vulgar,  more  open  to  the  laity,  and  to  women  who 
could  read  than  it  usually  is  to  the  clergy,  even  the  most 
learned  and  intelligent.  In  this  way  the  Gospel-pearl  is 
cast  abroad  and  trodden  under  foot  of  swine ;  and  that 
which  was  before  precious  both  to  clergy  and  to  laity  is 
rendered,  as  it  were,  the  common  jest  of  both." 

When  the  prior  returned  to  Vian's  cell,  he  knew  more 
of  the  kind  of  attention  which  had  been  bestowed  upon 
those  sentences  which  the  abbot  had  placed  in  Vian's 
way. 

The  words  of  Master  Knighton  lay  on  the  floor. 
Somebody  had  stepped  upon  them  violently,  and  Vian 
was  reading  stealthily,  but  with  unquestionable  delight, 
a  copy  of  one  of  the  letters  of  Wycliffe  in  which  the  Re- 
former said,  — 

"  Alas  !  alas  !  what  cruelty  is  this,  to  rob  a  whole  realm 


VI AN  THE  PYTHAGOREAN.  313 

of  bodily  food,  because  a  few  fools  may  be  gluttons,  and 
do  harm  to  themselves  and  others  by  their  food  taken 
immoderately  !  As  easily  may  a  proud  worldly  priest  err 
against  the  Gospel  written  in  English.  What  reason  is 
this,  if  a  child  fail  in  his  lesson  at  the  first  day,  to  suffer 
never  children  to  come  to  lessons  for  this  default?  Who 
would  ever  become  a  scholar  by  this  process?  What 
Antichrist  is  this  who,  to  the  shame  of  Christian  men, 
dare  to  hinder  the  laity  from  learning  this  holy  lesson 
which  is  so  hard  commanded  by  God?  Each  man  is 
bound  to  do  so,  that  he  be  saved ;  but  each  layman  who 
shall  be  saved  is  a  real  priest  made  of  God,  and  each 
man  is  bound  to  be  a  very  priest." 

Was  the  young  monk  Vian  really  interested  in  the 
thought  that  the  Scriptures  should  be  in  everybody's 
hand?  Yes;  but  he  then  looked  upon  them  from  an 
entirely  different  point  of  view  than  that  which  was 
occupied  by  the  men  who  were  slowly  bringing  it  about. 
Vian's  attitude  was  the  intellectual  attitude  furnished  to 
him  by  his  Wycliffite  blood,  and  yet  greatly  modified  by 
the  Renaissance.  As  a  child  of  a  Lollard,  he  could  not 
help  feeling  the  immense  moral  significance  of  the  Gos- 
pels ;  as  a  child  of  the  Renaissance,  he  did  not  see  why 
any  book  should  not  have  freedom  of  access  to  men's 
thought  and  lives.  The  same  power  which  had  objected 
to  Plato  and  Cicero  now  opposed  Saint  Luke  and  Saint 
John.  He  would  meet  it  in  his  soul  with  the  same  ar- 
guments, the  soul  of  which  was  this  conviction,  —  the 
human  mind  has  the  right  to  everything ;  nothing  is  too 
sacred,  nothing  is  too  secular.  Philosophy  had  made 
"  the  soul "  the  centre  of  Vian's  universe. 

Shortly  after  the  experience  with  which  his  vision- 
seeing  mind  had  indulged  itself  in  the  presence  of  that 
copy  of  the  Wycliffe  translation,  it  had  suffered,  as  such 
minds  do,  a  marked  relapse.  This  relapse  of  assurance 
as  to  the  value  of  the  Scriptures  had  not  affected  his  in- 


314  MONK  AND  KNIGHT. 

terest  in  them  as  remarkable  chapters  in  the  biography 
of  human  nature,  and  as  disclosures  of  the  Divine  nature. 
It  had,  however,  affected  the  feelings,  which  any  most 
turbulent  reformer  would  have  shared,  that  they  alone 
were  to  become  the  spiritual  authority  of  mankind. 

Thus  far,  not  the  Scriptures,  but  a  vision  of  loveliness 
and  beauty,  —  the  picture  of  his  soul's  mate,  —  had  been 
authoritative  over  his  moral  nature  at  critical  moments. 
And  it  is  true  with  every  Vian  now,  as  it  was  then,  that 
whatever  other  excellent  persons  think  or  promulgate  as 
the  proper  thing  to  be  believed  as  to  the  authority  of 
Scripture,  the  Bible  has  just  as  much  authority  as  it  has, 
and  no  more.  Every  man  gets  his  working  opinion  as 
to  the  future  experiences  of  men  with  a  fact  out  of  his 
own  experiences  with  that  fact. 

The  truth  is  that  soon  after  that  forelook,  so  vague  yet 
so  potent,  which  Vian  had  as  he  held  that  translation  in 
his  hand,  the  stubborn  fact  came  into  him  that  his  own 
life  had  been  kept  true  by  his  vision  of  that  beautiful 
child  of  his  boyhood  fancy,  who  was  now  growing  toward 
womanhood ;  and  he  clung  to  the  Scriptures  because 
they  found  him,  as  Coleridge  says,  at  another  point  of 
his  nature. 

Was  Vian's  picture  of  truth  and  loveliness  incarnate  in 
the  form  of  this  imagined  maiden,  a  hint  of  the  necessity 
which  we  all  feel  for  an  Incarnation  ? 

Is  it  not  true,  also,  that  until  one  sees  in  the  Bible, 
the  One  who  says,  "  I  am  the  truth,"  the  Bible,  as  the 
record  of  truth,  has  no  absolute  primary  authority  over 
him ;  and  it  only  remains  a  collection  of  most  interest- 
ing and  most  valuable  leaves  in  the  soul's  biography? 

Vian's  intellectual  interest  in  the  Scriptures  was  now 
doubled,  —  for  with  others  in  the  abbey,  he  had  been 
studying,  with  Fra  Giovanni,  the  philosophy  of  the  Greeks ; 
and  Vian  had  enthusiastically  embraced  the  Pythagorean 
ideas.  These  he  believed  were  entirely  harmonious  with 


VI AN  THE  PYTHAGOREAN.  315 

what  he  knew  of  the  Gospels,  and  especially,  as  we  shall 
see,  with  the  Epistles  of  Saint  Paul. 

The  Italian  monk's  hairless  pate  appeared  to  shine 
with  some  of  the  light  within  his  brain,  when  Fra  Giovanni 
proceeded,  amid  the  breathless  interest  of  his  students, 
to  wheeze  and  to  quote  the  sentences  of  Pythagoras  and 
those  of  his  disciple  Plato.  The  asthma  not  often  could 
conquer  his  enthusiasm  as  a  teacher,  —  an  enthusiasm  not 
equalled  in  any  other  task  he  had  Attempted  at  Glaston- 
bury,  save  that  with  which  he  pursued  the  abbot  with  a 
threat  of  opening  the  floodgates  of  scandal,  and  that 
with  which  he  had  succeeded  in  persuading  the  Renais- 
sance monks  that  the  whitewashed  stone  figure  which  he 
had  contrived  to  obtain  of  a  stone-cutter  near  the  Cam  was 
actually  a  fragment  of  Greek  art  of  the  age  of  Praxiteles. 

As  over  and  over  again,  this  old  sport  in  realms  intel- 
lectual told  Vian  how  the  monks,  who  had  arrogated  to 
themselves  the  Greek  spirit,  stood  at  a  safe  distance  and 
chattered  in  the  happiness  that  they  were  at  last  behold- 
ing a  statue  of  Demosthenes,  when  instead  they  were 
only  looking  at  an  ill-shapen  figure  of  human  mould 
which  the  half-witted  stone-cutter  had  sold  to  Fra  Gio- 
vanni for  a  spurious  indulgence,  and  in  his  glee  at  having 
so  completely  fooled  these  wiseacres,  the  Italian  would 
choke  up ;  his  nose,  whose  color  had  gained  not  a  little  of 
its  ruddiness  from  the  wine-cellar  of  the  abbot,  became 
almost  purple,  while  he  struggled  with  his  ludicrous 
theme.  This,  however,  was  as  nothing  to  the  self-forget- 
ting excitement  with  which  he  expounded  those  ideas  of 
the  transmigration  of  the  soul  and  of  the  true  nature  of 
womankind,  with  the  truth  of  which  he  saw  Vian  had 
soon  become  duly  impressed. 

The  atmosphere  which  came  with  Fra  Giovanni  from 
the  Italy  which  had  already  been  transformed  by  the 
Renaissance  was  full  of  pollen,  and  the  open  soul  of 
youthful  England  was  ready  to  receive  it. 


3l6  MONK  AND  KNIGHT. 

Fra  Giovanni  was  far  from  being  a  merely  humorous 
old  monk,  who  had  worked  his  way  to  power  by  the  eager 
use  of  the  information  which  had  reflected  unpleasantly 
upon  the  abbot.  His  very  humor  had  a  basis  of  scholar- 
ship ;  and  he  could  perfectly  exhibit  the  affectation  which 
he  now  saw  those  who  were  called  the  "Greeks"  in 
England  were  beginning  to  practise. 

Much  of  the  history  of  the  Italian  Renaissance  was  at 
length  repeating  itself,  even  in  the  courts  and  abbeys  of 
Britain.  Even  the  imitation  of  the  ancients  was  flagrant 
in  the  Ciceronians,  whom  Erasmus  had  ridiculed ;  and 
the  liberal  use  of  sentiments,  names,  and  classical  allusions 
in  conversation  had  become  a  ridiculous  travesty  to  the 
mind  of  the  monk.  Day  by  day  he  had  observed 
here  what  Italy  had  experienced ;  namely,  a  slavish 
emulation  of  Greek  or  Roman  thought.  Again  did  the 
world  see  the  saints  of  the  calendar  go  unconsulted 
in  the  naming  of  a  child ;  and  instead  of  Ambrose 
came  Achilles ;  instead  of  Ruth,  Atalanta ;  instead  of 
Paul,  Hector.  Giovanni  amused  himself  by  begging 
to  be  called  Jovianus ;  and  he  listened  as  he  smiled  at 
the  mention  of  Pierius  for  Peter,  as  once  he  had  heard 
the  Italian  Gianpaolo  called  Janus  Parhasius.  Architec- 
ture was  looking  backward  in  Vian's  mind,  as  he  still 
talked  with  the  abbot,  —  backward  even  to  the  Roman 
Basilicae,  where  Christianity  was  born.  Erasmus  had 
listened  to  a  sermon  in  Italy,  which  now  did  not  seem  so 
remarkable,  because  in  talk  and  public  speech  God 
Almighty  was  often  called  Jove  ;  His  son  Jesus,  Apollo  ; 
and  Mary,  the  mother  of  God,  Diana.  The  genius  of 
Thomas  More  was  writing  an  epigram  in  which  Caesar 
and  the  Nervii  change  places  with  Henry  VIII.  and  the 
French,  while,  as  before  in  Italy,  Curtius  or  Cecrops  or 
Iphigenia  was  useful  to  illustrate  the  power  of  that  divine 
passion  which  issued  in  the  death  of  Christ.  Cardinal 
Wolsey  was  called  an  augur ;  and  the  nuns  of  Mynchin 


VI AN  THE  PYTHAGOREAN.  317 

Buckland  were  denominated  Vestals  by  the  little  knot  of 
"  Greeks  "  at  Glastonbury.  The  hymnologists  knew  more 
of  Parnassus  than  of  Calvary;  and  the  valley  of  the 
shadow  of  death  of  the  Psalmist  gave  place  to  Tartarus 
and  Acheron. 

"  N<sw,"  said  the  paganism  of  Giovanni,  "  is  the  time 
to  spread  Pythagorean  ideas,  when  Cardinal  Wolsey  will 
recreate  the  palace  of  Lorenzo  de'  Medici  at  Hampton." 

Giovanni  was  to  be  disappointed  in  the  luxurious  car- 
dinal, who  was  to  be  a  statesman  almost  in  spite  of  his 
tastes  ;  but  in  Vian  he  was  not  to  be  disappointed.  Not 
many  months  had  gone  by  until  the  special  features  of 
this  philosophy  which  interested  Giovanni  had  a  new 
champion. 

"Why,"  said  Vian  to  the  sub-prior  one  day,  as  they 
walked  toward  the  cloisters,  "  the  doctrine  that  the  soul 
has  had  a  previous  existence,  and  is  on  its  way  through 
this  existence  to  others,  is  the  only  doctrine  which  will 
account  for  some  of  those  memories  which  come  up  out 
of  some  past  and  steal  like  clouds  over  the  mind's  sky." 

"  You  have  got  even  Giovanni's  wheeze,  Vian  !  By 
all  the  saints,  I  did  not  know  that  your  description  had 
come  to  this,"  said  the  sub-prior,  with  an  effort  at  being 
caustic. 

"Yes,"  lanquidly  replied  Vian;  "I  suppose  I  shall 
catch  bald-headedness  too.  Fra  Giovanni  has  wonderful 
powers  of  inoculation.  His  logic  confounds  me.  Bald- 
headedness  is  a  fact.  The  transmigration  of  souls  is  a 
fact.  I  am  amenable  to  facts;  but  I  must  not  — " 
and  then  Vian,  seeing  that  he  had  plunged  into  logical 
or  illogical  quagmires,  out  of  which  his  fresh  philosophic 
possessions  would  hardly  extricate  him,  added  with  a 
deeper  voice  :  "  I  do  not  know  enough  truth  yet  to  man- 
age the  errors  which  beset  me.  But  I  cannot  see  that, 
on  the  principles  of  Giovanni's  logic,  I  can  avoid  being 
bald-headed  —  " 


3l8  MONK  AND  KNIGHT. 

"  And  being  asthmatic,"  said  the  sub-prior,  laughing ; 
"but  what  about  your  own  soul,  Vian?  " 

"  I  would  rather  talk  about  that,"  said  the  new-fledged 
Pythagorean,  who  with  the  usual  audacity  of  a  young 
philosopher  willingly  attacked  the  most  serious  problems, 
in  order  perhaps  that  he  might  escape  the  primary  diffi- 
culties. "  I  know  that  I  must  have  lived  somewhere 
before  this  life  began." 

"  How  did  you  get  here?  "  asked  the  sub-prior. 

"  My  death  out  of  the  last  life  was  my  birth  into  this 
life.  My  death  out  of  this  life  will  be  my  birth  into  the 
next,"  answered  Vian.  "  You  have  read  Ovid's  poem  on 
our  old  master  Pythagoras  ?  " 

"No." 

"Well,"  and  Vian  stood  up  in  the  sunlight  as  it  came 
flooding  in  upon  the  cloisters,  "  I  will  recite  some  lines 
which  Fra  Giovanni  read  to  us  yesterday  from  Ovid,  — 

'  Death,  so  called,  is  but  old  matter 
In  some  new  form.     And  in  a  varied  vest 
From  tenement  to  tenement,  though  tossed, 
The  soul  is  still  the  same,  the  figure  only  lost ; 
And  as  the  softened  wax  new  seals  receives. 
Its  face  assumes,  and  that  impression  leaves, 
Now  called  by  one,  now  by  another  name, 
The  form  is  only  changed,  the  wax  the  same. 
Then,  to  be  born  is  to  be^in  to  be 
Some  other  thing  we  were  not  formerly. 
The  forms  are  changed,  I  grant ;  that  nothing  can 
Continue  in  the  figure  it  began.' " 

"  You  mean  to  tell  me,"  inquired  the  sub-prior,  "  that 
men  of  sense  in  ancient  times  did  actually  believe  such 
stuff?  This  must  have  an  end." 

"  Certainly ! "  said  Vian,  assuming  a  grandiose  air, 
and  fearing  nothing,  now  that  the  abbot  was  at  Par- 
liament. "  Men  of  sense  now  believe  the  truth  that 
the  soul  has  transmigrated  and  will  transmigrate. 
They  believe  it  just  as  did  Pythagoras  and  Plato  and 
Plotinus." 


VI AN  THE  PYTHAGOREAN  319 

"  Oh,  philosophers,  all  of  them,  Vian,  —  hair- brained 
men  !  " 

"  Ah,"  added  Vian,  with  warmth,  "  Virgil  and  Ovid 
believed  it." 

"  Poets,  poets  !  Philosophers  are  poets  who  write  fa- 
bles in  prose,  and  poets  are  philosophers  who  write  fables 
in  verse." 

"  Caesar,  was  a  hard-headed  fellow,  was  he  not?  " 

"  He  did  not  believe  in  it." 

"  Perhaps  not ;  but  he  found  that  the  Gauls  did  be- 
lieve it,  and  all  our  forefathers  in  Britain  as  well." 

"  The  whole  crowd  which  you  mention  was  a  crowd  of 
heathen." 

Vian's  authorities  had  not  been  so  satisfactory  even 
to  himself  as  he  could  have  desired,  until  he  had  be- 
gun to  read  again  his  Wycliffe  translation  of  the  New 
Testament. 

With  the  same  facility  with  which  thousands  since  his 
day  have  read  their  creeds  into  a  book,  most  of  which 
they  easily  toss  aside  if  need  be,  had  this  ambitious  ex- 
positor handled  the  Gospels  and  Epistles.  He  was  fresh 
from  his  labors  in  that  direction ;  and  now  he  proposed 
to  overwhelm  the  sub-prior  with  authorities  which  such 
an  ardent  Churchman  could  not  resist. 

"  The  Scriptures  themselves  proclaim  it.  Do  not  let 
this  assertion  of  mine  take  your  breath  !  "  said  Vian. 

"  I  do  not  wonder  that  Fra  Giovanni  finds  his  breath 
short  in  teaching  such  profanity,"  remarked  the  sub- 
prior,  whose  face  was  beclouded.  "  But  proceed  !  I 
shall  not  be  amazed  at  anything  now.  I  was  with  you 
once  at  Cambridge.  We  heard  strange  doctrines  there ; 
but  Erasmus  never  dreamed  of  this." 

"  I  will  proceed,"  said  Vian.  "  When  at  the  Augustin- 
ian  Monastery  the  other  day,  you  and  I  heard  them  teach 
that  all  men  sinned  in  Adam,  and  are  guilty  of  Adam's 
transgression —  " 


320  MONK  AND  KNIGHT. 

"That  is  no  more  Augustine,"  said  the  sub-prior, 
"than  it  is  Saint  Paul;  for  Saint  Paul  says,  'All  have 
sinned.'  " 

"  Yes,"  interrupted  Vian,  "  even  so ;  but  how  could 
you  have  sinned  in  Adam  if  you  were  not  there  ?  " 

The  sub-prior  shook  his  head,  but  it  was  the  move- 
ment of  an  unconverted  head. 

"  Then,"  said  Vian,  "  then  all  sin  which  is  so  active 
within  us  now  is  from  an  older  life.  That  is  '  the  man  of 
sin.'  Saint  Paul  himself  tells  us  of  his  conflict,  —  the  war 
between  the  one  man  and  the  other  in  him ;  the  old  man 
and  the  new.  You  remember  '  the  old  man '  and  '  the 
new  man'  in  Saint  Paul?" 

"  Which  man  is  Saint  Paul?  " 

"  Why,"  said  the  startled  Pythagorean,  who  now  saw 
that  he  had  one  man  too  many  on  his  hands,  —  "  why, 
Saint  Paul  had  lived  before  this  life.  He  had  —  " 

The  sub-prior  took  courage  at  Vian's  evident  perplex- 
ity, and  broke  forth  again  with  the  old  effort  at  being 
caustic  :  "  There  may  be  four  Saint  Pauls  in  his  next  life, 
if  this  multiplication  keeps  up.  Oh,  nonsense,  Vian  !  " 

"Wiser  Churchmen  than  you  have  accepted  and 
preached  this  truth,"  said  Vian  smartly,  gaining  his  feet. 
"  Origen  —  " 

"  He  was  heretical." 

"  So  is  every  man  who  is  greater  than  the  common- 
place men  about  him." 

"Well,  who  else?"  inquired  the  sub-prior,  com- 
placently. 

"  Philo  himself  said  that  the  soul  had  lost  its  heavenly 
home,  and  come  down  to  the  earthly  body  as  to  a  strange 
place.  Clement  of  Alexandria  and  Porphyry  found  the 
doctrine  in  Saint  Paul." 

"  Porphyry  has  no  authority  at  Glastonbury,"  said  the 
dignified  sub-prior. 

"  Well,"  inquired  the  disturbed  Vian,  "who  has?  " 


VI AN  THE  PYTHAGOREAN.  $21 

"  Ah,  Vian,  you  have  !  You  have  assumed  it  over 
your  own  mind.  This,"  —  and  now  the  sub-prior  assumed 
the  august  importance  of  a  defender  of  the  faith,  —  "  this 
is  all  the  upshot  of  this  disobeying,  free-thinking  ten- 
dency which  Erasmus  himself  has  started,  and  which  John 
Colet  and  Thomas  More,  —  God  be  thanked,  Thomas 
More  now  sees  the  error  !  —  this  is  all  of  it  the  result  of 
what  they  have  encouraged  in  England.  Germany  is 
alive  with  heresy." 

"  Why,"  said  the  surprised  Vian,  "  you  have  lost 
ground,  since  you  read  the  Greek  poets  so  delightedly  in 
secret !  " 

"  I  have  found  the  ends  of  some  of  these  perilous  roads 
which  I  have  been  travelling  with  men  who  ought  to  have 
known  better ;  I  see  now  what  the  outcome  of  all  this 
will  be.  As  I  said,  the  air  of  Germany  is  poison  itself. 
We  can  have  no  Holy  Church  at  all,  if  this  keeps  up. 
That  monk  Luther — " 

"  I  do  not  like  the  turbulent  fellow.  I  understand  he 
does  not  like  Erasmus  or  his  New  Testament." 

"  Well,  turbulent  or  calm,  any  man  who  protests  now 
is  simply  starting  a  revolution  which  will  end  by  making 
every  man  his  own  guide  and  priest.  The  protesters  do 
not  agree ;  they  will  protest  against  one  another,  and 
there  will  be  no  Church  at  all.  Vian,  you  have  wit 
enough  to  see  in  what  direction  things  are  going." 

Vian  had  thought  of  all  this ;  and  lover  of  order,  ad- 
mirer of  power  as  he  was,  seeing  also,  as  he  did  from  a 
merely  intellectual  point  of  view,  the  necessity  for  some 
kind  of  an  organization  which  should  hold  society  to- 
gether, he  had  often  been  disturbed  at  the  disorganizing 
tendencies  of  some  of  these  movements. 

But  for  the  present  he  was  under  the  dominion  of 

another  idea.     His  moral  life  had  never  felt  the  touch 

of  the  Church,  and  he  seemed   to  be  within  touch  of 

an  idea  which  might   league   itself  somehow  with  that 

VOL.  i.  —  21 


322  MONK  AND  KNIGHT. 

vision  of  his  soul's  mate,  and  help  him  to  solve  practical 
problems. 

He  said  :  "  But  what  has  all  that  to  do  with  the  truth 
or  untruth  of  the  doctrine  of  Pythagoras  ?  If  the  Scrip- 
tures teach  it,"  —  and  now  to  Vian's  somewhat  refreshed 
mind  the  Scriptures  did  teach  it,  —  "  why  should  you  ask 
any  questions?  " 

"Who  interprets  the  Scriptures?  "  asked  this  authority 
of  the  Church.  "  You  do  for  yourself.  There  is  the  as- 
sumption of  your  individual  mind  again,  Vian,  —  the  curse 
these  protesters  will  bring  upon  us  !  " 

"  Well,"  said  Vian,  "what  do  you  do  with  such  a  Scrip- 
ture as  this  :  '  Who  hath  chosen  us  before  the  foundation 
of  the  world  '  ?  Origen  himself  could  not  be  heretical 
enough  to  take  the  truth  out  of  it.  We  were  somewhere 
when  God  made  His  choice  of  us.  And  then  there  is 
this  Scripture  :  *  If  ye  will  receive  it,  this  is  Elias  which 
was  for  to  come.'  That  is  the  word  of  Jesus  Christ  him- 
self about  the  man  whom  men  knew  at  that  time  as  John 
the  Baptist.  Even  John  did  not  deny  the  assertion  that  he 
was  Elijah  re-incarnated.  Jesus  said  :  '  Before  Abraham 
was,  I  am.'  " 

The  sub-prior  was  now  the  perplexed  one.  "  I  have 
always  been  unable  to  understand  those  texts,"  said  he, 
with  evident  honesty. 

"  They  are  no  more  hard  to  the  mind  than  are  the  ex- 
periences of  such  a  soul  as  yours,"  said  Vian,  adding  to 
the  sub-prior's  perplexities  by  summoning  more  difficulties 
to  his  overwhelming. 

"What  do  you  mean?  " 

They  had  strolled  together  beyond  the  chapel,  and 
were  looking  over  the  Avalonian  hills. 

"We  certainly  come  into  the  world  with  more  than 
ourselves,"  continued  Vian.  "  There  is  a  treasured  up 
amount  of  experience  which  we  have  had  somewhere  else 
to  begin  this  life  with.  Then  the  new  experience  which 


VI AN  THE  PYTHAGOREAN.  323 

we  have  here,  —  some  of  it  we  can  attach  to  the  old, 
some  of  it  we  cannot.  What  we  are  to-day  and  what 
we  see  to-day  are  determined  in  no  little  measure 
by  what  we  brought  out  of  the  other  life.  'To  him 
that  hath  shall  be  given ;  to  him  that  hath  not  shall  be 
taken  away  even  that  which  he  hath.'  Have  you  never 
had  dreams?" 

"  In  daytime  ?  " 

"  Yes ;  dreams  of  old  places  and  beautiful  skies,  or  of 
sorrows  which  you  could  not  have  had  here,  —  perhaps 
also  of  love?" 

"  Ah,  Vian,  you  have  touched  me  now.  I  have  had 
memories  which  I  could  not  obliterate  nor  quicken  into 
definite  experiences.  Sometimes  I  feel  that  I  am  very  old, 
very  old.  Then  I  remember  a  youth  which  was  far  away, 
and  then  some  one  else  whose  life  I  have  lived  seems 
to  be  speaking.  I  do  not  dare  to  go  to  certain  cells 
in  the  abbey,  because  there  I  have  felt  that  I  may 
meet  an  old  self.  I  know  there  are  songs  I  have 
not  heard  here  which  I  must  have  heard  elsewhere ; 
and,  Vian,  you  know  I  am  not  carnally  minded,  but 
I  have  prayed  to  be  delivered  from  kisses  which  seem 
to  float  to  my  lips  from  some  sweet  past.  Is  this  what 
you  mean?  " 

"  Precisely,"  said  Vian,  who  looked  at  the  somewhat 
shrunken  and  dry  lips,  and  immediately  pitied  the  sub- 
prior  because  he  was  not  a  Pythagorean.  "  But,  now, 
how  is  it  that  you  do  not  fear  the  effect  of  this  reliance 
upon  your  individual  experience  in  this  controversy? 
You  are  as  bad  as  any  protester  in  your  assertion  of  the 
authority  of  the  individual.  On  the  matter  of  your 
own  experience,  then,"  added  he,  tauntingly,  "you  are 
authority." 

The  sub-prior's  head  was  full  of  another  set  of  prob- 
lems. Vian  saw  it,  and  went  on  to  say  :  "  Why,  Pythago- 
ras, our  master,  remembered  his  previous  existences. 


324  MONK  AND  KNIGHT. 

He  was  a  herald  once,  named  .^Ethalides ;  then  a  Tro- 
jan called  Euphorbus.  No  wonder  that  you  dread 
the  old  cell,  if  as  a  monk  you  did  any  such  thing  as 
dream  of  loving  anybody  in  that  other  life,  —  for  it 
is  real ;  this  memory  is  true.  Pythagoras  found  in  the 
temple  of  Juno  at  Argos  the  very  shield  with  which,  when 
he  was  Euphorbus  in  the  Trojan  War,  he  had  attacked 
Patroclus." 

The  sub-prior  was  beginning  to  be  annoyed  with  the 
names  of  people  of  whom  he  had  never  heard,  and  like 
a  swimmer  in  strange  seas,  he  anxiously  paddled  back 
where  the  water  was  no  less  deep,  even  if  the  shore  was 
more  familiar. 

"  But,"  said  he,  as  an  assembly  of  carrion  crows 
wheeled  about  in  the  upper  distances  and  slowly  found  a 
path  unseen  through  the  purple  haze  to  some  carcass 
hidden  amid  the  little  trees,  —  "  but  the  souls  of  men 
then  transmigrate  into  the  birds  or  beasts  which  at  death 
or  birth  they  most  resemble." 

"  Those,"  said  Vian,  pointing  to  the  fading  specks  in 
the  sky,  "  are  souls  in  penitential  agony.  They  are  the 
spirits  of  lovers  of  scandal.  They  have  to  content  their 
gross  appetites  on  decaying  animals  now ;  they  used  to 
content  themselves  on  the  simple  prospect  of  a  decaying 
character.  Poor  things  !  "  Then  Vian  quietly  quoted 
Ovid  again :  — 

"  Souls  cannot  die.     They  leave  a  former  home, 
And  in  new  bodies  dwell,  and  from  them  roam. 
Nothing  can  perish,  all  things  change  below  ; 
For  spirits  through  all  forms  may  come  and  go. 
Good  beasts  shall  rise  to  human  forms,  and  men, 
If  bad,  shall  backward  turn  to  beasts  again. 
Thus  through  a  thousand  shapes  the  soul  may  go, 
And  thus  fulfil  its  destiny  below." 

The  sub-prior  was  silent  for  a  moment,  and  then  he 
said  with  feeling,  "  Well,  I  should  be  glad  to  find  some 
philosophy  which  would  give  us  a  new  chance ;  "  and  he 


VI AN  THE   PYTHAGOREAN.  325 

added,  "  But  this  is  very  fascinating,"  as  he  hurried  away 
to  attend  to  duties  now  too  long  postponed. 

It  was  now  Vian's  turn  to  be  honest  with  his  most  re- 
mote doubt;  for  two  certain  reflections  had  annoyed 
him.  "  But,"  said  he,  "if  I  have  only  two  rocks  against 
which  I  may  perhaps  go  to  pieces,  that  is  a  smaller 
number  of  perils  than  I  ever  confronted  before ;  and  if 
these  two  rocks  are  far  enough  apart,  I  may  be  able  to 
sail  between  them." 

The  one  difficulty  concerned  itself  with  the  reverence 
and  worship  which  Vian  had  hitherto  given  to  the  Holy 
Virgin.  How  could  he  still  look  with  prayerful  awe  upon 
her  lovely  Majesty,  and  still  hold  that  every  woman  was 
but  some  man  who  had  sinned  in  some  previous  exist- 
ence, and  had  thus  suffered  retribution?  Just  this  idea 
even  the  greatest  of  Pythagoreans  had  hinted  at  as  the 
explanation  of  the  fact  of  womankind. 

The  other  difficulty  was  of  the  same  sort,  —  both 
were  rocks  whose  bases  met  beneath  a  shallow  sea.  It 
concerned  itself  with  that  vision,  —  the  dream  picture  of 
his  childhood. 

The  mate  of  his  soul  whom  he  had  met  so  often  in 
vision,  in  spite  of  Abbot  Richard  and  the  penances,  had 
now  grown  almost  to  fancied  womanhood.  Still  she  re- 
mained, —  the  one  ideal  of  his  spirit,  the  inspiration  and 
guide  of  his  life.  Often  he  seemed  to  hear  her  voice  or 
to  feel  the  glorious  presence  near. 

Still,  if  she  lived  anywhere,  she  was  a  woman  ! 

He  had  come  to  look  upon  her  as  some  one  whom 
he  had  known  in  some  other  life,  so  thoroughly  had 
she  possessed  his  mind  and  heart  in  this  life.  Hardly 
had  Vian  thus  accounted  for  the  powerful  influence 
of  this  exquisite  dream  upon  him  by  certain  princi- 
ples of  Pythagoreanism,  until  he  was  assured,  by  cer- 
tain other  principles  of  that  philosophy  as  Giovanni 
understood  it,  that  the  picture  itself  was  of  saddest  sig- 


326  MONK  AND   KNIGHT. 

nificance.  His  darling  was  growing  up  in  his  soul  to  be 
a  woman  ! 

That  meant  of  course  that  she  had  been  a  man  in  some 
other  life,  and  had  sinned.  It  seemed  incredible  to  his 
brain  and  cruel  to  his  heart. 

"  Oh,  if  only  we  could  take  portions  of  these  philoso- 
phies and  creeds,  and  believe  them,  life  would  be  toler- 
able," cried  Vian,  as  he  sought  sleep  that  night  in  vain. 


CHAPTER   XXX. 

A    CALL   UPON   THE   CARDINAL. 

"  Cloth  of  gold  do  not  despise, 

Though  thou  match  with  cloth  of  frieze ; 
Cloth  of  frieze,  be  not  too  bold, 
Though  thou  match  with  cloth  of  gold." 

AT  the  hour,  in  1517,  when  the  Lateran  Council  con- 
cluded its  tasks,  the  city  of  Rome  appeared  again 
to  be  as  it  had  been  in  the  days  of  Caesar,  —  the  centre 
of  the  world ;  and  the  Pope  was  the  governing  soul  of 
all.  But  religious  Caesarism  had  now  had  its  brightest 
days.  The  seven  hills  of  Rome  no  longer  had  room  for 
the  diversified  interests  of  man.  The  centre  of  the  world 
was  elsewhere.  Even  spiritual  monarchy  no  longer  gov- 
erned absolutely. 

Barefooted  Leo  X.,  in  a  procession  which  repeated 
the  prayers  newly  set  up  in  all  the  churches,  saw,  or 
thought  he  saw,  rising  at  his  desire,  a  world-wide  crusade 
against  the  Turk.  In  his  fancy,  the  Emperor  of  the  Ger- 
mans was  already  crossing  the  Danube  ;  Henry  VIII.  and 
Francis  I.  were  sailing  together,  united  at  last  with  his 
Holiness,  as  their  ships  swept  over  the  Mediterranean 
t3\vard  a  conquest  of  Constantinople.  Everything  seemed 
leagued  against  the  Turk.  Cardinal  legates  had  been 
sent  to  the  courts  of  Europe  ;  and  a  five  years'  truce  had 
been  proclaimed. 


328  MONK  AND  KNIGHT. 

If  Leo  X.  had  looked  westward  before  his  eyes  had 
been  dazzled  by  a  sun  which  so  rapidly  was  leaving  the 
East,  he  would  have  seen  the  advancing  of  long  lines  of 
purple  and  gray  and  gold,  which  would  have  told  him  that 
the  true  crusader,  following  after  Columbus,  would  move 
in  a  direction  entirely  opposite  to  this  churchly  goal,  and 
that  in  Wittenberg  was  a  single-handed  monk  whom  he 
must  consult  before  there  could  be  a  common  cause  worth 
the  attention  of  Christian  princes.  True,  the  Greek 
scholars  who  were  exiled  from  Constantinople  in  1453, 
had  fired  the  soul  of  the  Pope  with  an  enthusiasm  against 
the  Turk  which  no  other  Pope  had  known.  But  they  had 
initiated  a  westward  march.  Leo  X.  was  also  in  many 
regards  the  general  in  control  of  the  forces  of  the  Renais- 
sance. He  saw  that  it  was  possible  to  recover  the  Par- 
thenon, perhaps  also  the  manuscripts  of  Homer  and 
Hesiod  and  .^Eschylus,  as  well  as  the  grave  of  the  Christ ; 
for  which  recovery  other  crusades  had  set  out.  What 
though  as  yet  Christendom  did  not  share  his  admira- 
tion for  such  spoils  as  the  statues  of  Praxiteles  or  the 
decorations  of  the  Temple  of  Athene  !  Still  would  Europe 
see  to  it  that  the  Turk  was  beaten  back ;  and  with  it  all, 
he  would  fill  the  splendor  of  the  unfinished  St.  Peter's 
with  the  choicest  of  the  glories  of  ancient  Greece.  It 
was,  in  most  respects,  a  worthy  dream.  But  even  Greek 
ideas  had  been  making  other  visions  in  the  human  mind, 
which  were  to  league  themselves  with  a  movement  that 
Leo  X.  had  scarcely  stopped  to  respect. 

Said  Erasmus :  "  I  wish  that  even  the  weakest  woman 
might  read  the  Gospels  and  the  Epistles  of  Saint  Paul.  But 
the  first  step  to  their  being  read  is  to  make  them  intelli- 
gible to  the  reader.  I  long  for  the  day  when  the  hus- 
bandman shall  sing  portions  of  them  to  himself  as  he 
follows  the  plough,  when  the  weaver  shall  hum  them  to  the 
tune  of  his  shuttle,  when  the  traveller  shall  while  away 
with  their  stories  the  weariness  of  his  journey." 


A    CALL    UPON  THE   CARDINAL.  329 

In  1516  the  New  Testament  of  Erasmus  had  been 
printed ;  and  even  Bishop  Fox  had  remarked,  "  It  is  as 
good  as  ten  commentaries."  The  Renaissance  had  again 
robed  itself  as  a  reformation. 

But  naturally  enough  did  Leo  X.,  Henry  VIII.,  Charles 
of  Austria,  and  Francis  I.  soon  turn  from  such  an  event 
as  the  printing  of  a  book,  to  the  question  as  to  which  one 
of  these  earthly  sovereigns  should  succeed  to  a  throne 
made  vacant  by  the  death  of  Maximilian,  in  January, 
1519.  Leo's  idea  of  a  crusade  had  long  before  this  been 
shattered.  Wolsey  had  so  treated  Cardinal  Campeggio, 
who  was  sent  to  England  as  papal  legate,  as  to  leave  no 
doubt  in  the  mind  of  his  Holiness  that  England  and 
Henry  VIII.  at  present  proposed  to  offer  no  obsequious 
respect  to  Rome.  The  marriage  which  the  Pope  had 
arranged,  whereby  Francis  I.  was  to  have  been  attached 
to  the  papal  see,  had  eventuated  in  another.  Charles 
was  too  powerful  in  Italy  to  please  the  Pope,  as  a  can- 
didate for  Charlemagne's  throne;  and  Henry  VIII. 
looked  on  through  the  scheming  eyes  of  Cardinal  Wolsey 
as  Francis  I.  offered  abundant  gold  and  brilliant  prom- 
ises, writing  to  his  great  rival  these  words :  "  Two  lovers 
are  we,  wooing  the  same  mistress ;  and  whichever  she 
may  choose,  should  be  looked  upon  with  no  envy  by 
his  fellow-contestant." 

Ami  sat  at  Amboise  with  Astr£e,  rehearsing  to  her  the 
objections  which  he  had  urged  upon  his  sovereign  against 
this  course,  telling  her,  as  her  dark  eyes  looked  into  his 
restless  soul,  how  impossible  such  an  ambition  was  of  fulfil- 
ment, and  assuring  her  who  at  that  hour  loved  him  more 
than  all  the  prospective  emperors  of  earth,  that  Cardinal 
Wolsey  was  so  managing  affairs  that  the  new  emperor 
and  Francis  I.  should  seem  to  be  foes. 

Back  came  the  four  hundred  German  lanzknechts 
and  Admiral  Bonnivet,  who  looked  more  stupid  than  ever 
to  Ami,  as  the  admiral  stood,  without  his  four  hundred 


330  MONK  AND   KNIGHT. 

thousand  crowns,  to  tell  Francis  I.  how  he  promised 
Cardinal  Wolsey  fourteen  votes  for  the  papal  chair  in 
vain,  how  the  wily  cardinal  quietly  aided  the  nephew  of 
Katherine  of  Arragon  his  queen,  and  how  Charles  was 
elected  king  of  the  Romans. 

In  England,  at  that  moment,  Bishop  Fox  and  Thomas 
More  were  both  bewailing  the  absence  of  Erasmus,  whom 
Wolsey  had  offended  by  offering  him  only  a  prebend  at 
Tournay ;  and  Henry  VIII.  remarked  that  he  had  prom- 
ised himself  that  he  would  not  remove  his  beard  until  he 
had  met  the  King  of  France,  and  that  Francis  I.  had  said, 
"  I  protest  I  will  never  put  mine  off  until  I  have  seen  the 
King  of  England." 

"All  things,"  again  said  Pace,  "are  full  of  deceit,  'et 
Judas  non  dormit.'  " 

In  the  early  evening  of  September  6,  1519,  Abbot 
Richard  Beere  of  Glastonbury,  riding  on  Wolsey's  mule, 
which  his  Eminence  had  sent  to  London  for  his  use, 
looked  restively  from  the  river  Thames  on  his  right,  over 
the  elm-trees  which  shaded  the  slight  undulation  at  his 
left,  as  he  approached  that  impressive  collection  of  clois- 
ters, turrets,  parapets,  lattices,  and  red  brick  walls  known 
as  Hampton  Court.  Long  lines  of  wood  flanked  the 
stream  at  intervals ;  and  in  and  out  flew  the  fly-catchers. 
The  brook-wagtails  were  wading  over  the  gravel  near  the 
edge  of  the  stream,  as  it  reappeared  to  his  view;  and 
early  as  it  was  for  him,  now  and  then  a  jacksnipe  fas- 
tened the  attention  of  the  tree-creepers  which  looked 
down  upon  him  from  the  branches  above  the  oozy  bogs. 
On  the  other  side,  in  a  small  patch  of  scrubby  heath  and 
gorse,  hedge-sparrows  and  black  buntings  were  flitting 
about.  The  reeds  in  the  stream  were  unmoved  with 
the  soft  fading  summer  breath  which  was  vanishing  before 
the  autumn ;  and  the  low  hum  of  insects  round  about  the 
bushes  which  hung  over  and  dipped  into  the  stream, 
seemed  perfectly  harmonious  with  a  silent  farewell  which 


A    CALL    UPON  THE   CARDINAL.  331 

was  breathing  itself  out  of  the  ample  sky  to  the  summer 
time. 

The  mule  had  been  jogging  on  easily,  until  the  abbot 
saw  before  him  the  red  glory  of  the  cardinal's  garden, 
luxuriant  in  that  early  autumn  day,  whereat  he  compelled 
the  animal  to  slacken  his  pace,  and  turning  to  look  upon 
the  willows  fringing  the  stream,  the  hedgerows  extending 
far  beyond  the  mighty  oaks  which  appeared  as  the  sym- 
bol of  power,  he  said,  — 

"  Even  Nature  herself  is  magnificent  in  the  presence 
of  such  a  magnificent  person.  Here,"  added  the  anti- 
quarian soul  of  Abbot  Richard,  "  where  the  Hospitallers 
of  St.  John  were  abolished,  comes  this  our  cardinal, 
eight  stout  oarsmen  rowing  him  down  the  river  Thames 
from  Whitehall,  to  show  all  Churchmen  how  to  live 
in  splendor." 

It  had  been  a  perplexing  day  for  the  cardinal  at  West- 
minister Hall ;  but  to  the  astonishment  of  the  abbot,  he 
was  ushered  in  at  once,  and  found  himself  again  before 
Thomas  Wolsey,  who  just  now  had  pushed  aside  con- 
siderations from  Whitehall,  the  college  at  Oxford,  foreign 
ambassadors,  despatches  from  his  agents  everywhere,  and 
even  Henry  VIII.,  to  give  some  directions  concerning 
the  paling  which  was  to  divide  the  parks,  and  the  color 
for  the  bricks  of  the  buttressed  wall. 

Gloomy  as  had  been  the  mind  of  Abbot  Richard,  as  he 
thought  of  parting  with  Vian,  the  hour  had  come  when 
he  was  a  burden  at  Glastonbury ;  and  the  soul  of  his  old 
friend  believed  that  so  marked  and  various  were  his 
talents  that  only  such  a  leader  as  Wolsey  could  com- 
mand them  all.  Richard  Beere  knew  the  cardinal  so 
well  that  he  never  feared  that  Vian's  heresies  would 
annoy  him,  or  block  up  the  path  to  the  young  man's 
advancement.  The  abbot  was  an  ecclesiastic  always, 
sometimes  a  politician ;  Wolsey  was  always  a  politician, 
and  sometimes  an  ecclesiastic. 


332  MONK  AND   KNIGHT. 

11  Others  may  not  surround  their  houses  and  gardens 
with  a  moat,"  said  the  cardinal.  "  It  is  a  custom  quite 
sure  to  die ;  but  so  also  the  custom,  if  so  it  may  be 
called,  of  asking  one  such  as  I  am  to  such  perilous 
tasks,  — that  will  die.  I  however  shall  defend  myself/' 

Abbot  Richard  was  never  so  impressed  by  his  own 
admirable  self-command. 

Together  they  looked  with  Master  Laurence  Stubbes  at 
the  plans  for  the  ornamentation  of  the  palace.  The 
abbot  was  amazed.  He  had  seen  Wolsey  in  public,  and 
he  remembered  the  magnificence  ;  but  such  private  splen- 
dor surpassed  his  fancy. 

In  the  morning  there  was  but  one  topic.  Over  and 
over  again  did  they  talk  of  Vian's  acquaintance  with  archi- 
tecture, of  his  rare  good  sense  and  his  exquisite  taste. 
Of  his  learning,  virtue,  and  force  of  mind,  Wolsey  had 
informed  himself  at  a  previous  time. 

Public  business  was  pressing;  and  Wolsey,  having 
spoken  the  word  which  made  Vian  his  servant,  dismissed 
the  abbot  with  his  affectionate  farewell. 


CHAPTER  XXXI. 

THE   FIELD    OF   THE   CLOTH   OF   GOLD. 
"  Good  friends,  French  and  English." 

A  PPEARING  like  a  vague  but  shining  certainty  for 
2~\  many  months  before  the  minds  of  French  and 
English  statesmen  and  politicians,  was  the  proposed 
interview  between  the  two  sovereigns,  which  at  length 
was  to  leave  only  a  fairy  page  in  the  record  of  pageantry, 
and  to  be  known  as  the  "  Field  of  the  Cloth  of  Gold." 

To  the  amazement  of  Wolsey,  Vian,  who  had  always 
hitherto  appeared  interested  in  grave  and  significant 
things,  proved  himself,  in  the  discussions  of  plans,  cere- 
monials, and  proposed  buildings,  to  be  the  only  man  of 
his  acquaintance  able  to  conceive  and  execute  a  scheme 
which  would  worthily  attest  the  seeming  importance  of 
this  royal  interview.  He  had  learned  enough  of  archi- 
tecture at  Glastonbury,  where  Richard  Beere  was  splen- 
didly memorializing  his  own  faith  in  the  Holy  Church, 
to  confound  the  architects  about  Hampton  Court  and 
Whitehall  with  questions  which  they  could  not  answer, 
and  plans  which  they  did  not  comprehend.  He  was, 
for  so  young  a  man,  a  master  of  French  as  well  as  of 
English  history ;  and  he  united  to  Wolsey's  love  of  pomp 
and  circumstance  his  own  interest  in  the  proper  arrange- 
ment of  shields  and  banners. 


334  MONK  AND  KNIGHT. 

He  was  unable  to  hold  his  own  place,  in  such  a  busi- 
ness, in  one  realm  alone.  Knighthood  he  did  not  know, 
save  in  the  translation  of  the  "  Gests  of  King  Arthur  " 
and  in  "  Froissart."  This,  under  the  circumstances,  how- 
ever, did  not  trouble  him. 

"  As  to  the  lists,  arming  and  barbing  of  steeds,  arranging 
of  combatants,  and  conduct  of  the  jousts,"  said  Vian  one 
day,  in  the  presence  of  the  luxurious  Sir  Richard  Wing- 
field,  ambassador  to  France,  who  had  been  appointed  to 
succeed  the  niggardly  Sir  Thomas  Boleyn,  "  I  am  assured 
that  I  may  trust  entirely  to  the  young  knight  of  the 
French  Court  who  has  all  those  matters  in  charge.  He 
is  a  favorite  of  Bayard ;  and  he  is  a  scholar  as  well  as  a 
knight." 

The  courtly  Sir  Richard  bowed  his  head  in  assent,  and 
added  :  "  A  wonderful  man  is  he.  He  is  beloved  by 
Francis  I.  as  is  no  other  man  in  his  kingdom.  Indeed, 
it  is  said  in  France,  that  it  was  by  a  wise  word  of  the 
young  knight  that  the  king  saved  himself  at  Marignano. 
His  Holiness  has  presented  him  with  a  jewel ;  and  his 
heart  is  with  a  maiden  within  the  French  court." 

Vian  listened  attentively  to  this  remark,  and  forgot  it 
not  when  the  4th  of  June  came. 

Interminably  long  and  complex  seemed  the  necessary 
preparations  for  this  magnificent  interview.  Probably 
history  records  no  such  prodigal  expenditure  of  color  and 
sound  for  so  little  value  received.  Of  Francis  I.  and 
Henry  VIII.  it  must  be  said,  that  each  was  a  luxurious 
monarch  who  hoped  to  impress  the  other  with  his 
resources  and  magnificence.  Wolsey,  who  had  been 
appointed  proctor  by  both  kings,  was  conscious  of  an 
ambition  to  outshine  every  rival  in  Church  and  State.  As 
he  blunderingly  talked  over  the  precedents  of  chivalry 
with  Vian,  his  eyes  brightened,  and  he  was  pleased  beyond 
measure  at  recitals  of  silk,  tapestries,  and  glittering  arms. 
The  time  itself,  as  we  have  seen,  breathed  such  ostenta- 


THE   FIELD   OF  THE   CLOTH  OF  GOLD.        335 

tious  competition  in  the  minds  of  sovereigns.  The  fancy 
of  the  age  burst  forth  in  one  last  glowing  eulogy  of  decay- 
ing chivalry ;  and  in  the  presence  of  ideals  which  it  did 
not  comprehend  or  discern,  it  luxuriantly  decorated  the 
dissolving  dream  of  ancient  pageantry. 

"  The  young  knight,  Ami  Perrin,  —  is  that  the  name  ? — 
he  must  not  be  allowed  to  outrival  us  in  splendor,"  said 
the  cardinal. 

"  Sir  Richard  has  his  ear  close  to  the  zealous  courtier," 
replied  Vian  ;  "  and  Sir  Richard,  for  England's  honor,  tells 
me  all.  Like  the  King  of  France  himself,  his  trusted 
soldier  seems  courteous  and  consenting.  I  like  the 
knight  Ami." 

"  Courteous  and  consenting,  Vian?  Let  him,  then, 
arrange  with  his  sovereign  Francis  I.  for  a  longer  proro- 
gation of  the  interview,  in  order  that  we  may  bring  to 
a  happy  conclusion  our  communication  with  Emperor 
Charles  V.,"  said  Wolsey,  who  had  begun  to  trust  Vian 
with  all  State  secrets,  and  who  especially  desired  to  talk 
over  the  possibility  of  making  an  alliance  between  Henry 
VIII.  and  the  emperor. 

Queen  Katherine  herself,  the  emperor's  aunt,  did  not 
more  truly  desire  to  postpone  the  interview  with  the 
French  monarch  than  did  Wolsey.  But  even  Wolsey 's 
sickness  in  April  could  not  stand  in  the  way.  The 
neglected  and  unseemly  fields  —  Guisnes  and  Ardres  — 
must  be  cleared  up,  and  the  tedious  romance  enacted. 

Up  to  the  very  day  of  the  interview,  rumors  ran  from 
court  to  court,  threatening  to  set  all  preparations  at 
nought. 

Summoned  at  once,  on  his  arrival  in  England,  into  the 
presence  of  Wolsey,  Vian  was  confronted  by  the  report 
that  amid  the  duplicities  of  Wolsey  himself,  the  cardinal 
had  detected  the  French  monarch  engaged  in  operating 
a  plan  dishonorable  and  crafty. 

"  Tell    me,"    said    the     angry    cardinal,    "  are    large 


336  MONK  AND  KNIGHT. 

bodies  of  men,  armed  and  belligerent,  secretly  hid  in 
the  field?" 

"  By  the  honor  of  the  young  knight  whom  I  trust,  I  say 
to  your  eminence,  Nay  !  "  answered  Vian. 

"Why  do  you  not  swear  by  the  honor  of  Francis  I., 
King  of  France  ?  "  inquired  his  Grace. 

"  He  has  none,"  answered  Vian. 

"  By  your  own  honor,  swear  !  " 

"  I  have  already  promised  you,  my  Lord  Cardinal,  that 
all  shall  be  well.  My  promise  is  my  oath." 

The  cardinal  extended  his  hand,  and  Vian  kissed  it. 
The  fact  is  that  Vian  had,  ten  days  before,  for  the  first 
time  met  the  young  knight  in  close  and  earnest  debate 
on  this  delicate  subject.  On  that  occasion  Ami,  with 
whom  Vian's  official  relation  to  the  proposed  interview 
had  brought  him  into  intimate  association,  had  proved 
himself  a  knight  indeed.  The  report  to  which  Wolsey 
alluded  had  produced  its  effect  upon  Vian ;  and  the  busy 
notes  of  labor,  as  it  wove  the  subtle  melodies  of  color 
upon  the  field  of  Guisnes,  were  stopped  suddenly,  when 
he  was  informed  that  twelve  large  vessels  had  been 
equipped  by  the  French  King.  English  monk  and 
French  knight  stood  opposed  for  an  hour  in  such  a 
manner  as  to  make  Sir  Richard  Wingfield  and  Admiral 
Bonnivet,  who  depended  upon  the  young  knight  Ami  as 
did  Cardinal  Wolsey  upon  the  young  monk  Vian,  tremble 
for  the  result.  After  the  hot  words  and  mutual  conces- 
sions to  courtesy,  Ami  produced  assurances  signed  and 
sealed  by  Francis  I.,  and  Sir  Richard  agreed  to  forward 
them  to  Wolsey  at  Hampton  Court.  No  one  rejoiced  more 
heartily  in  the  vanishing  of  the  clouds  than  Francis  I. 

Charles  V.,  who  had  been  for  a  time  in  Spain,  was  now 
nearer  than  ever  to  the  ear  of  Wolsey.  "  The  emperor," 
said  the  knight  to  the  monk,  "  does  not  mean  that  our 
sovereigns  shall  negotiate  with  friendliness,  or  arrange 
their  affairs  in  love." 


THE  FIELD  OF  THE   CLOTH  OF  GOLD.        337 

"  Not  seven  thousand  ducats  as  a  pension,  nor  two 
Spanish  bishoprics,  can  shake  the  desire  of  my  Lord 
Cardinal  for  the  interview  between  their  Majesties," 
answered  the  monk. 

The  knight  smiled ;  and  Vian  saw  that  Ami  had  as 
much  faith  in  the  honor  of  the  English  Cardinal  as  he 
himself  had  in  that  of  the  French  Sovereign. 

Charles  V.  was  not  to  be  circumvented.  May  26 
came ;  and  Vian  handed  to  his  Majesty  at  Canterbury, 
at  which  place  the  English  monarch  had  stopped  on  his 
way  to  the  place  of  embarkation,  the  information  that  the 
Emperor  Charles  V.  and  his  fleet  had  arrived  at  the  port 
of  Hythe. 

"  Politics  and  ecclesiastics  are  much  alike,"  said  the 
audacious  Vian  to  Cardinal  Wolsey,  "  especially  when  the 
Pope  is  concerned  in  both." 

"The  loftiest  place  in  politics,"  replied  the  wary 
cardinal,  "  is  an  ecclesiastical  one ;  and  the  most  impor- 
tant position  in  ecclesiastics  is  a  political  one." 

The  papal  chair  seemed  again  to  rise  like  a  possible 
possession  before  the  eye  of  Wolsey  the  Chancellor ;  and 
unconsciously  his  sovereign,  Henry  VIII.,  was  already  in 
training  for  the  headship  of  the  English  Church.  In 
after  years  Wolsey's  remark  appeared  to  Vian  to  have 
been  another  unnoticed  testimony  to  his  incomparable 
genius. 

Before  a  week  had  gone,  Henry  VIII.  and  Charles  V. 
had  repaired  together  to  the  cathedral  at  Canterbury, 
stood  lovingly  before  the  bones  of  Saint  Thomas  a  Becket, 
and  arranged  their  affairs  so  unanimously  that  the  King 
of  the  Germans  and  Spaniards  had  no  fear  of  Francis  I. 
Even  Cardinal  Wolsey  could  now  enjoy  the  galas  of  the 
"  Field  of  the  Cloth  of  Gold,"  as  he  should  muse  on  the 
promise  of  Charles  the  Emperor,  that  he  would  help 
him  to  the  papacy. 

Conscious  that  if  any  two  of  the  three  young  sovereigns 
VOL.  i.  —  22 


338  MONK  AND  KNIGHT. 

of  Europe  should  enter  into  offensive  and  defensive 
alliance  against  him,  the  third  would  be  conquered,  each 
one  of  the  sovereigns  themselves,  the  Pope  at  Rome, 
and  above  all,  Italy,  galled  by  the  Austrian  yoke,  knew 
the  significance  of  any  union  of  the  houses  of  Valois  and 
Tudor.  Charles  V.  had  anticipated  fate.  While  the 
young  French  knight  was  congratulating  the  English 
monk,  on  May  30,  that  their  task  as  servants  of  the  two 
courts  was  so  happily  concluded  to  the  spoiling  of  the 
plans  of  Charles  V.,  that  calculating  monarch  was  rejoicing 
over  his  bloodless  victory  at  Canterbury,  as  he  said  to  his 
quieted  soul,  — 

"  It  is  well  that  the  brilliant  pageant  about  to  occur  at 
Guisnes  has  been  already  transformed  into  a  gorgeous 
farce.  The  alliance  of  the  lilies  of  France  with  the 
leopards  of  England  would  be  equal  to  the  dismemberment 
of  half  our  empire." 

Did  the  masterful  monarch  perceive  that  the  battle  of 
Pavia  was  just  ahead  ? 

The  day  for  the  interview  dawned  over  that  arid  plain 
which,  by  the  intelligence  and  skill  of  Vian  and  Ami, 
instructed  and  emboldened  as  they  were  by  Cardinal 
Wolsey  and  Admiral  Bonnivet,  had  been  transformed 
into  a  gigantic  dream  of  unparalleled  magnificence. 

"  Men  might  say, 

Till  this  time  pomp  was  single  ;  but  now  married 
To  one  above  itself.     Each  following  day 
Became  the  next  day's  master,  till  the  last 
Made  former  wonders  its.     To-day  the  French, 
All  clinquant,  all  in  gold,  like  heathen  gods, 
Shone  down  the  English ;  and  to-morrow  they 
Made  Britain  India  :  every  man  that  stood, 
Showed  like  a  mine." 

Amid  it  all,  however,  there  were  two  men  to  whom 
life's  realities  had  become  so  identified  with  struggles  — 
one  a  struggle  of  the  intellect  toward  freedom,  the  other 
a  struggle  of  conscience  toward  purity  —  that  whatever 


THE  FIELD   OF  THE   CLOTH  OF  GOLD.        339 

else  men  might  lose  or  gain,  for  contemporary  politics 
or  personal  glory,  they  were  predetermined,  by  the  fatal- 
ity of  significant  circumstances,  to  find  each  for  himself, 
on  the  "  Field  of  the  Cloth  of  Gold,"  an  important  date, 
a  memorable  milestone.  These  were  the  English  monk 
and  the  French  knight. 

Francis  I.  of  France  already,  as  we  have  seen,  had 
learned  to  find  his  happiest  moments  in  the  society,  not 
of  his  queen,  but  rather  in  that  of  Mme.  de  Chateau- 
briand. Life  was  richest  and  poorest,  as  he  walked  with 
this  favorite  in  the  gardens  of  the  Tuileries,  or  gayly 
rowed  with  her  over  the  smooth  Seine.  In  vain  had  the 
king  sought  to  make  Ami's  love  for  Astre'e  a  cloak  for 
royal  iniquity.  He  had  used  everything  else  but  Ami's 
conscience.  But  in  vain,  also,  did  the  knight  seek  to 
render  his  sovereign's  court  at  Guisnes  irreproachable  by 
the  absence  of  this  favorite,  or  at  least  by  her  wise  acqui- 
escence in  arrangements  which  would  not  humiliate  the 
neglected  Queen  Claude  in  the  presence  of  Katherine, 
who  up  to  that  hour  had  kept  the  love  of  her  royal 
husband,  Henry  VIII.  Mme.  de  Chateaubriand  had 
trampled  in  more  serious  ways  upon  Ami's  sagacious 
counsels  to  Francis  I.  She  was  for  war  with  Charles  V. 
So,  also,  was  Louise  of  Savoy.  One  held  this  position 
because  of  her  ambition  for  a  commonplace  brother ;  the 
other,  because  of  her  ambition  for  a  royal  son. 

Never  had  the  favorite's  plans  come  so  near  to  Ami's 
heart  with  a  wound  as  now.  The  prudent  knight  was 
deeply  pained,  when,  on  the  arrival  of  the  French  court 
from  the  capital,  he  perceived  in  the  midst  of  the  court- 
ladies  his  own  Astree,  compelled  by  the  king  to  appear 
at  the  side  of  Mme.  de  Chateaubriand.  Rage  took  pos- 
session, for  a  moment,  of  Ami's  heart  and  hand.  But 
he  was  a  knight  and  a  lover.  Instantly,  as  he  beheld 
AstreVs  innocence,  his  soul  was  melted  from  stern  and 
sharp  opposition  into  affectionate  welcome  and  joy. 


340  MONK  AND  KNIGHT. 

"  Surely,"  thought  he,  "  the  reins  of  political  power 
are  no  longer  mine  to  hold ;  but  my  love  shall  be  mine 
own,  though  every  ceremony  fail  and  the  pageant  fade 
away." 

He  had  been  more  than  anxious  that  some  of  the 
words  which  the  monk  Vian  had  recently  said  to  him 
might  be  spoken  in  the  hearing  of  Astree.  He  was 
fully  conscious,  as  Vian  had  told  him  of  his  life  at  Glas- 
tonbury  and  of  the  growth  of  the  Reformation  ideal  in 
England,  that,  in  circumstances  which  often  threatened 
to  overwhelm  them,  each  was  fighting  a  distinct  battle 
against  a  common  foe.  The  old  knighthood  had  gone, 
and  the  new  knighthood  had  desired  a  kind  of  purity 
which  the  Church  did  not  foster.  The  old  monastic 
scholarship  had  also  departed,  and  "  the  new  learning  " 
was  treated  by  the  Holy  Church  with  tortures  or  with 
contempt.  He  was  also  aware  that  each  was  making  a 
desperate  attempt  to  keep  in  hearty  loyalty  to  the  insti- 
tution itself.  Neither,  as  yet,  had  conceived  it  possible 
for  the  world  to  exist  without  an  authoritative  Church. 

They  had  even  talked  over  the  event  of  Wittenberg,  — 
ninety-five  theses  posted  on  the  gate  of  the  castle  church, 
October  31,  nearly  three  years  before  !  Vian  had  con- 
fided to  Ami  the  secret  that  Wolsey  had  besought  him, 
who  had  so  little  genuine  faith  in  the  Holy  Church,  to 
assist  his  sovereign  Henry  VIII.,  who  had  even  less  faith 
in  the  popes  and  bishops  at  Rome,  in  the  completion  of 
a  book  against  the  heresy  of  Luther,  —  a  work  which 
Henry  VIII.  had  meditated  at  least  since  June,  1518, 
and  of  which  he  had  written  to  Pace,  his  secretary,  —  a 
work  which  the  cardinal  thought  wretchedly  incomplete, 
until  some  more  learned  man  than  the  king  should  sup- 
ply its  defects  in  the  history  of  the  sacraments. 

"  It  is  yet  undone,"  said  Vian ;  "  but  when  amity  is  re- 
stored between  the  sovereigns,  we  shall  behold  a  king 
attending  to  a  captious  monk." 


THE  FIELD   OF  THE   CLOTH  OF  GOLD.        341 

Ami  replied,  "  Perhaps  there  are  more  of  such  monks 
than  of  such  kings." 

As  he  spoke,  he  was  consumed  with  the  old  protest- 
ing fire  with  which  he,  a  child  of  a  Waldensian,  looked 
so  deeply  into  the  soul  of  a  Wyclifrlte's  son. 


CHAPTER  XXXII. 

JEALOUSY   AND   MAGNIFICENCE. 

Their  dwarfish  pages  were 
As  cherubins  all  gilt;  the  madames  too, 
Not  used  to  toil,  did  almost  sweat  to  bear 
The  pride  upon  them,  that  their  very  labor 
Was  to  them  as  a  painting ;  now  this  mask 
Was  cried  incomparable ;  and  the  ensuing  night 
Made  it  a  fool  and  beggar.     The  two  kings, 
Equal  in  lustre,  were  now  best,  now  worst, 
As  presence  did  present  them,  —  him  in  eye 
Still  him  in  praise,  and  being  present  both 
'T  was  said  they  saw  but  one,  and  no  discerner 
Durst  wag  his  tongue  in  censure.     When  these  suns 
(  For  so  they  phrase  them )  by  their  heralds  challenged 
The  noble  spirits  to  arms,  they  did  perform 
Beyond  thought's  compass. 

SHAKSPEARE. 

THE  events  of  which  history  has  preserved  many 
descriptions,    at    length    commanded    laborious 
attention. 

Vian  had  exhausted  the  lore  of  precedents  as  to 
buildings  and  banners ;  Ami  had  taxed  his  learning  con- 
cerning chivalry  and  royal  ceremonial.  One  had  his 
mind  full  of  altar-cloths,  vestments,  images,  jewels,  and 
names  of  church  dignitaries;  the  other's  intellect  was 
crowded  with  visions  of  lances,  doublets,  bows  and  ar- 
rows, crests,  troops  of  cavalry,  heralds  and  pursuivants, 
and  the  names  of  the  princes  of  the  blood. 


JEALOUSY  AND  MAGNIFICENCE.  343 

At  length  Wolsey,  attended  by  a  shining  retinue,  with 
solemn  magnificence  rode  over  two  leagues,  toward  the 
tents  and  pavilions  which,  with  ornamentation  of  gold 
and  silver,  had  been  fitted  up  with  halls,  galleries,  and 
chambers,  outside  the  walls  of  Ardres,  as  the  lodgings  of 
the  French.  As  he  saw  the  gilt  figure  of  Saint  Michael, 
mantled  with  blue,  holding  a  fiery  dart  and  bearing  the 
emblazoned  shield  of  France,  he  said  to  Vian,  — 

"  Our  French  cousins  have  great  art  in  them,  Vian,  but 
they  know  not  all  the  arts  of  politfcs." 

The  monk  made  response  by  silence.  He  then  knew 
that  he  had  loaned  his  abilities  to  the  creation  of  a 
phantasm. 

No  one  of  the  fifty  gentlemen  of  the  household,  who, 
with  bonnets  in  hand,  sat  resplendent  with  golden  chains 
on  velvet-clothed  horses,  heard  the  remark.  The  huge 
gold  maces  and  the  shining  pole-axes  trembled  not,  nor 
did  the  vast  crucifix  of  gold  and  gems  tax  unduly  the 
hooded  and  crimson-robed  cross-bearer,  who,  with  the 
lackeys  following  beneath  waving  plumes,  still  believed 
in  the  sincerity  of  the  skilful  and  magnificent  Wolsey. 

He  was  riding  behind  them,  looking  out  from  beneath 
his  red  hat,  whose  tassels  fell  about  his  face  and  hid  his 
calm  and  arrogant  eye,  his  imperious  and  regnant  lips, 
his  determined  and  commanding  jaw.  His  very  trusty 
mule  was  so  covered  with  gold  and  color  as  to  rival  in 
splendor  even  the  bishops  and  archers  who,  with  the 
grand  prior  of  Jerusalem,  made  up  his  train. 

"  Ah  !  "  thought  Vian,  "  the  human  soul  is  loaded  down 
with  trappings  of  another  age.  What  if  they  be  gold,  if 
yet  they  enslave  !  " 

As  Vian  helped  Lhe  cardinal  to  dismount,  Ami,  in 
obedience  to  Bonnivet,  ordered  the  discharge  of  artillery, 
which  with  its  incessant  roar  was  thundering  amid 
drums  and  blaring  trumpets.  The  tumult  drowned  the 
soft  and  affectionate  tones  in  which  the  King  of  France, 


344  MONK  AND  KNIGHT. 

bonnet  in  hand,  received  the  accredited  representative 
of  the  English  throne. 

At  the  departure  of  the  Lord  Cardinal,  Vian,  who  re- 
mained with  Ami  to  further  some  arrangements  as  to  the 
visit  of  ceremony  which  on  the  next  day  was  to  be  paid 
by  the  French,  found  himself  in  the  presence  of  ladies 
whose  dresses  were,  in  his  eyes,  only  as  rich  as  they  were 
immodest.  Pearls  and  gold  vied  with  color  and  the 
rarer  gems  to  enrich  the  velvets  and  silks  in  which  these 
courtly  dames  of  France  appeared. 

Amid  all  this  female  ostentation,  nothing  seemed  so 
supernally  beautiful  to  the  eye  of  the  English  monk  as 
the  modest  and  quiet  damsel  whose  soft  dark  eyes 
brightened  into  vivid  recognition  of  the  name  he  bore, 
whose  exquisite  lips  parted  with  the  least  mechanical  of 
smiles  which  Vian  had  ever  seen  upon  a  woman's  mouth, 
and  whose  words  evidently  came  from  such  a  simple  and 
refined  soul  as  he  fancied  lived  only  in  heaven.  It  was 
Astree ;  and  Ami,  with  a  dominant  sense  of  her  loveliness, 
had  presented  Vian  to  his  love,  with  a  most  knightly  re- 
mark as  to  Vian's  intelligence  and  abilities.  He  had, 
however,  hardly  completed  his  sentences,  when  he  be- 
came startled  at  his  own  feelings. 

"  Fortunate  knight !  "  said  the  scholarly  Englishman 
to  Ami,  as  they  went  about  their  duties.  "  Such  a  face 
redeems  the  court  of  France ;  such  an  eye  would  rein- 
vest the  decaying  knighthood  of  Europe  with  the  soul 
of  the  oldest  chivalry." 

The  remark  only  added  pain  to  Ami's  self- discovery. 
He  thought  only  once  of  Nouvisset's  corrective  words. 

Somehow  Ami  could  not  easily  get  his  own  words  to  fol- 
low one  another,  as  they  had  done.  Vian  standing  there 
in  the  glow  of  the  evening,  his  fine  nostril  dilating  still 
with  the  high  excitement,  his  eyes  strangely  abysmal 
and  poetic  in  the  fervid  light,  because  of  something,  — 
Vian  looked  altogether  too  intellectual,  too  unearthly, 


JEALOUSY  AND  MAGNIFICENCE.  345 

too  learned,  too  interesting.  Astre"e  must  have  felt  the 
charm  ! 

Vian  attempted  to  talk  with  Ami  about  the  arrange- 
ments of  the  mimic  combats,  in  which  already  the  troops 
of  cavalry  were  indulging  as  they  were  going  through 
their  manoeuvres ;  but  Ami  was  questioning  his  own  soul 
as  to  what  Astr£e  could  have  meant  when  she  said  to 
him  that  this  man  Vian  looked  as  Nouvisset  had  de- 
scribed the  knight  of  the  future,  —  "a  conqueror  with 
accepted  truth  as  his  shield  and  unaccepted  truth  as  his 
sword." 

Vian  tried,  also,  to  dispose  of  the  cofferer  and  master- 
masons,  who,  with  hundreds  of  bricklayers  and  servants 
of  all  sorts,  were  demanding  to  be  set  to  a  task  in  the 
morning;  but  Ami  was  of  little  assistance. 

His  vision  was  beclouded  with  the  besetting  query, 
"  Why  did  I  not  at  once  seize  the  occasion,  and  tell  her 
girlish  trustfulness  that  this  Vian  is  a  monk,  and  a  monk 
discredited  by  Glastonbury  Abbey  too?" 

The  great-voiced  chamberlain  could  get  no  satisfactory 
answer  to  his  questions,  when  they  were  propounded  to 
Ami.  Even  the  warder  who  had  in  charge  the  shipping, 
was  disgusted  at  the  knight's  heavy  manner.  Still  were 
the  claret  fountains,  "  fed  by  secret  conduits  hid  beneath 
the  earth,"  spouting  forth  their  treasures  into  golden 
vessels  and  silver  cups ;  and  still  was  Vian  wondering 
what  could  have  broken  in  upon  the  strong,  calm  current 
of  Ami's  intellectual  life. 

"  Perhaps,"  said  Vian,  "  he  has  had  some  unfortunate 
news  from  the  capital ;  I  will  not  disturb  the  privacy  of 
his  suffering." 

All  night  long  Vian  kept  dreaming  or  thinking  of  the 
rigidity  with  which  his  new-found  friend  —  as  he  ven- 
tured to  call  him  —  bade  him  farewell,  and  the  evidence 
of  unpleasant  and  unremitting  intellectual  labor  with 
which  his  face  was  so  strangely  clouded. 


346  MONK  AND  KNIGHT. 

Day  came,  however,  and  with  it  another  of  those  elabo- 
rate processions  which  suited  not  the  more  profound 
and  comprehensive  ideas  that  had  dominated  the  souls 
of  the  knight  and  the  monk.  These  thoughts  came 
to  Vian  with  more  force,  because  Lord  Shrewsbury,  who 
was  steward,  and  Essex,  who  was  marshal,  had  each  ex- 
pressed his  contempt  of  some  of  the  arrangements  whose 
conception  had  originated  with  Vian. 

"I  fancy  that  if  the  German  monk  lives,  and  the 
Church  goes  on  blessing  ignorance  and  cursing  scholars, 
there  will  be  more  important  processions  than  these," 
said  the  nettled  monk. 

At  the  same  moment  Ami,  in  Astree's  hearing,  had 
uttered  his  contempt  for  the  whole  performance.  Astre"e 
knew  not  why  he  should  so  warmly  say, — 

"  The  monk  Martin  Luther,  opposing  the  sale  of  in- 
dulgences, was  a  much  more  inspiring  scene  for  a  Chris- 
tian to  behold,  than  Wolsey  on  his  mule." 

Even  Francis  L,  who  through  Louise  of  Savoy  had  be- 
gun again  to  suspect  Ami  of  some  sort  of  religious  heresy 
which  might  embarrass  politics,  felt  that  at  the  earliest 
hour  he  must  bring  him  under  the  influence  of  a  con- 
servative companion. 

"  Who  could  be  more  likely  to  serve  the  king  in  hold- 
ing Ami  fast  to  the  Holy  Church  than  the  English  monk 
whom  he  has  so  admired  in  these  days  at  Guisnes?"  said 
Louise  of  Savoy  to  his  Majesty. 

He  resolved  to  bring  them  together  soon,  and  further 
to  cement  a  friendship  which  he  did  not  fancy  had 
suffered  the  slightest  fracture. 

The  next  day  the  French  returned  the  visit  of  the 
English ;  and  Ami,  who  under  AstreVs  eye  had  quite 
rallied  from  his  discomfiture  of  the  day  before,  warmly 
greeted  Vian,  who  was  more  than  delighted  with  his 
courtesy.  The  ceremonies  attendant  upon  the  meeting 
of  the  two  monarchs,  on  Thursday,  June  7,  were  soon 


JEALOUSY  AND  MAGNIFICENCE.  347 

completed  ;  and  Wolsey  and  Bonnivet,  placing  the  care 
of  other  days  into  the  hands  of  those  persons  selected 
for  the  honor,  granted  blessings  upon  the  monk  and  the 
knight,  who  henceforth  might  consider  themselves  as 
guests  of  both  sovereigns. 

"  I  am  miserable  enough,"  said  Ami  to  Astre'e,  as  the 
long  shadows  began  to  fall  upon  the  heads  of  countless 
bills  and  lances  without  the  pavilion,  and  through  the 
plain  and  bowed  windows  separated  .by  golden  columns, 
died  away  until  they  were  lost  among  the  silver  pillars, 
heavy  with  arabesques  and  enamelled  ornaments  that 
contrasted  magically  with  the  gay  fringes  which  hung 
over  the  heads  of  these  lovers. 

"  Miserable  with  me  in  your  arms?"  she  inquired,  as 
she  looked  up  into  his  fiery  eyes. 

Ami  yielded  not  his  grasp  as  he  protested :  "  You  are 
all  that  might  reconcile  me  to  this  continuous  parade 
of  lies.  I  am  afraid  that  everything  but  you  may  prove 
untrue." 

"  That  is  a  sweet  faith  for  a  lover,  until  the  loved 
one  finds  that  experience  with  disappointing  people  has 
created  the  suspicion  that  some  day  the  best  loved  shall 
also  prove  a  disappointment,"  quietly  lisped  the  dear 
lips,  which  now  kissed  one  of  those  fiery  eyes. 

"  I  wish  you  could  kiss  me  blind,"  said  he,  sharply. 

"You  are  adding  sorrow  to  my  wonder  of  you,  Ami," 
said  Astre'e,  with  pathos. 

"  Oh,  you  are  my  pleasure  and  my  pain,  —  my  pain, 
because  you  are  my  joy.  It  is  nothing  that  you  do  which 
pains  me,  but  you  are  so  lovely  in  the  eyes  of  others." 

"  Would  you  not  have  it  so,  if  only  I  am  yours  and 
yours  alone?  " 

"  I  could  dash  out  trie  life  of  a  priest  who  dared  to 
steal  a  glance  from  that  eye  !  Astre'e,  did  you  know  that 
Vian  is  a  monk,  —  a  Benedictine,  once  at  Glastonbury 
Abbey,  —  and  that  he  is  now  in  politics  with  Wolsey  ?  " 


348  MONK  AND   KNIGHT. 

"  No ;  never  had  I  heard  his  name,  until  you  blessed 
it  with  your  friendship.  I  fear  a  monk." 

That  was  exactly  what  Ami's  jealousy  was  willing  for 
her  to  say,  even  to  the  great  wronging  of  Vian.  Ami's 
demon  had  come  again.  He  himself  was  startled  by  its 
power.  He  thought  now  he  should  be  able  to  shut  the 
passion  up  in  her  acknowledged  fear  of  monks.  Yet 
that,  he  knew,  was  not  enough.  Somehow  he  must  do 
Vian  justice;  and  he  said, — 

"  Astre"  e,  have  I  done  wrong  ?  No  angel  of  heaven 
should  have  a  fear  of  Vian ;  but  I  know  he  thinks  ad- 
miringly of  you.  He  is  my  friend;  and  — "  Half 
ashamed  of  the  discovery  he  had  made  of  himself  to  one 
so  innocent  and  so  wise,  he  added :  "  I  am  not  sad  be- 
cause of  Vian  or  of  you.  Treat  him  with  all  admiring 
kindliness.  I  am  thinking  of  something  else.  I  hate 
the  farce  behind  which  Charles  V.  is  connected,  in  which 
my  king  is  aimlessly  playing  his  part." 

So  easily  does  the  heart  oftentimes  flee  into  the  head 
with  its  woes,  and  rename  them  there. 

As  the  7th  of  June  came,  Vian  and  Ami  were  once 
more  called  into  the  service.  Francis  I.  was  more  cer- 
tain that  the  plans  of  Bonnivet  would  not  miscarry,  if 
Ami  were  in  the  place  which  his  very  abilities  had  cre- 
ated for  him ;  and  Wolsey  was  never  quite  easy  without 
Vian  at  his  elbow. 


CHAPTER  XXXiII. 

LOVE   AND   LEARNING. 

"  Qui  pleure  larmes  par  amour 
N'en  sent  mal  ni  douleur." 

A  STRIDE'S  eyes  were  full  of  love  as  she  girded  her 
knightly  Ami,  on  the  morning  of  the  pth ;  and 
never  did  a  kiss  possess  for  him  such  lasting  preciousness 
as  did  that  which  still  seemed  to  live  upon  his  lips,  when 
the  knight  found  himself  riding  with  the  French  King  to 
meet,  in  the  presence  of  that  mighty  company,  the  King 
of  England. 

The  gay  colors  of  the  handsome  tent  sparkled  in  the 
dawn.  Palisades  surrounded  it ;  and  the  tennis-court 
near  by  was  exactly  midway  between  the  two  camps. 
Three  hundred  English  archers  guarded  the  Sovereign  of 
France  ;  four  hundred  Frenchmen  of  like  position  pro- 
tected the  English  King. 

Ami  had  said  to  Vian,  "Your  king  has  crossed  the 
Channel  to  meet  his  brother,  Francis  I. ;  the  Sovereign  of 
France  will  be  the  first  to  cross  the  frontier  to  greet 
Henry  VIII.  of  England." 

"This  is  well,"  answered  Wolsey's  trusted  lieutenant. 

Soon  after,  the  shot  was  fired  from  the  castle  of 
Guisnes.  The  castle  at  Ardres  gave  answer.  Overlook- 
ing the  plain,  mounted  on  a  charger  heavily  laden  with 


35O  MONK  AND  KNIGHT. 

mosaic  of  finest  gold,  Henry  VIII.,  stout  and  yet  well 
proportioned,  sat  like  the  sovereign  he  was,  his  ruddy 
face  aglow  with  interest,  while  the  soft  air  played  upon 
his  silver  damask  apparel,  which  shone  with  ribs  of  cloth 
of  gold ;  and  his  commanding  eye  beheld  afar,  at  a 
proper  distance,  the  French  King.  Taller  and  more 
graceful  than  the  English  Sovereign,  Francis  I.,  his  finely 
shaped  form  covered  with  gold  and  jewels  which  lay 
upon  the  cassock  of  gold  frieze,  appeared  a  most  fasci- 
nating figure,  as  he  lifted  his  arm,  which  was  weighted 
with  diamonds,  rubies,  and  clinquant  pearls  and  emer- 
alds, to  place  more  safely  upon  his  head  a  velvet  bonnet, 
which  was  also  studded  with  gems.  The  eye  of  France 
had  caught  the  eye  of  England. 

Ami  and  Vian  beheld  it  all  with  deep  excitement.  In 
a  brief  time,  the  provost- marshal  and  his  archers  had 
cleared  the  way.  The  marshals  of  the  army  followed ; 
and  their  luxuriantly  caparisoned  horses  made  a  slow- 
moving  line  of  yellow  flame.  Princes  and  the  King  of 
Navarre,  who  now  moved  rapidly,  could  see  before  them 
the  English  monarch  clad  beneath  the  damask,  which 
was  thrown  back,  in  velvet  of  the  deepest  crimson  and 
satin  of  purest  white,  each  garment  fastened  or  adorned 
with  jewels ;  his  plume  was  made  more  attractive  than 
that  upon  the  bonnet  of  the  French  King,  because  of  the 
star  of  brilliants  which  held  it  fast. 

Astre"e  remarked,  as  the  kings  came  near  each  other, 
that  the  eyes  of  the  English  King  were  very  bright  and 
piercing. 

"  And  very  illusive,"  said  Ami,  who  desired  to  foster 
no  admiration  in  her  soul  for  things  English. 

The  monarchs  were  approaching.  The  scarf  of  gold 
and  purple  which  Francis  I.  wore  over  his  almost  radiant 
vest  seemed  to  caress  the  long,  wavy  hair,  which  was 
partially  held  by  a  damask  coif  that  was  rough  with  gems. 
His  black  mustache  contrasted  with  the  golden  hair  be- 


LOVE  AND  LEARNING.  351 

neath  Henry's  stout  chin ;  and  now  Vian  remarked  upon 
the  languishing  eyes  of  the  French  King. 

"  But  the  eyes  of  your  sovereign  are  powerful,"  ven- 
tured Astre"e,  who  said  it  as  though  not  enough  attention 
had  been  paid  by  Ami  to  the  earlier  remark  as  to  Henry's 
eyes. 

What !  should  she  and  Vian  be  found  in  agreement 
even  upon  this  topic? 

Ami  looked  confused.  The  confusion  of  the  knight 
was  shot  through  with  something  fiery  enough  to  re- 
mind Astre"e  of  the  naked  sword  which  just  now  she 
had  seen  in  the  hand  of  the  old  Marquis  of  Dorset,  who 
rode  before  the  King  of  England. 

Ami  at  length  said,  "  The  king's  face  is  heavy." 

"  With  thoughtfulness,"  added  Vian,  who  remembered 
the  opinion  which  Erasmus  held  of  Henry  VIII. 

"  I  shall  complete  my  own  sentences,  if  it  please  you," 
retorted  Ami,  who  at  once  touched  Astree's  wrist  with  a 
distinct  and  commanding  forcefulness  she  had  never  no- 
ticed when  she  had  felt  the  stroke  of  his  hands  of  love. 

"  This  is  not  a  moment  for  a  fitting  answer  to  your 
remark.  If  you  are  a  knight,  you  may  understand  my 
saying,"  said  the  cool  monk,  remembering  how  the 
French  emotion  had  often  unhorsed  the  destiny  of  em- 
pires in  the  presence  of  English  common-sense. 

It  was  a  perplexing  moment  to  both,  and  Astree's  ruby 
lips  opened  as  does  a  flower  to  emit  fragrance. 

Just  then  a  horse  —  one  which  had  been  gayly  covered 
for  the  use  of  the  attendant  of  the  Earl  of  Shrewsbury, 
a  horse  which  had  proved  to  be  vicious  and  had  broken 
loose,  frightened  by  the  noise  made  by  the  hautboys, 
trumpets,  and  drums  of  the  Swiss  guards  who  followed 
the  Grand  Master,  covered  with  foam  and  cloth  of  gold, 
dashed  across  the  border  line,  and  came  plunging  along 
through  dust  and  air,  swiftly  rushing  toward  the  three 
persons  whose  words  we  have  just  heard. 


352  MONK  AND  KNIGHT. 

Altogether  unnerved  by  the  hateful  passion  which  had 
again  flamed  within  his  bosom,  Ami  was  devising  with 
fatal  rapidity  a  plan  for  AstreVs  safety  which  would  have 
placed  her  in  the  path  of  the  furious  steed.  At  that 
moment  Vian's  eye  was  running  along  the  line  of  splen- 
dor made  up  of  Sir  Henry  Guildford,  the  henchmen, 
the  Lord  Cardinal  Buckingham,  and  the  rest.  At  the 
next  instant,  he  saw  Astre"e  in  the  hands  of  a  man  who 
had  for  the  moment  lost  the  power  of  wise  reasoning. 
The  woman  was  imperilled  by  a  terrible  death. 

Summoning  all  his  energies  into  two  strong  arms,  and 
swift  as  thought,  Vian  seized  the  frightened  creature, 
who  was  blindly  trusting  to  the  arms  of  Ami,  and  tore 
her  from  her  lover  and  from  danger.  In  a  breath  the 
horse  was  away;  the  knight,  who  himself  had  escaped 
death  only  by  good  fortune,  yet  lay  in  the  dust-covered 
path  of  the  beast ;  and  Astree,  lovely  as  a  silent  dream, 
was  still  in  a  faint,  held  within  the  gentle  but  strong  arms 
of  the  monk. 

"  Villain  !  "  cried  Ami,  as  he  staggeringly  approached 
with  his  dagger  quivering  before  him.  "  A  monk  !  a 
false  monk  you  are  !  " 

"  Lying  knight  and  wretch  !  Are  you  thankless  to  me 
for  saving  the  life  of  this  fair  creature —  " 

"  This  creature  you  have  befouled  !  Nay,  nothing 
could  befoul  her  white  soul.  But  I  challenge  you  !  " 
growled  the  angry  courtier,  as  he  caught  Astree  from  the 
grasp  of  her  protector. 

"I  am  a  monk  !  "  —  Vian  really  wished  he  had  never 
tried  to  be  anything  else,  —  "I  am  a  monk  and  a  gentle- 
man, a  Pythagorean  also,  a  servant  of  my  Lord  Cardinal 
and  the  king,  and  I  must  forbear  to  speak  to  you  now.  I 
shall  henceforth  refuse  to  act  with  you  in  this  business 
of  our  sovereigns.  Farewell,  excellent  lady  !  " 

Vian  mounted  his  horse,  rode  away,  and  was  soon  ex- 
changing civilities  with  Bourbon,  the  Constable  of  France, 


LOVE  AND  LEARNING.  353 

in  the  valley  of  Ardres.  As  he  looked  upon  the  sword  of 
State  borne  by  Bourbon,  and  into  the  face  of  the  Grand 
£cuyer,  Vian's  mind  often  wandered  to  Ami.  He  never 
had  hated  a  monk  in  Glastonbury  as  he  hated  that  pas- 
sionate jealousy  which  he  now  saw  was  almost  a  madness. 
What  would  become  of  Astra"  e  ?  Would  she  ever  know 
what  had  happened  ? 

While  he  had  been  rescuing  the  beautiful  woman  from 
what  otherwise  would  have  been  certain  death,  the  mon- 
archs  had,  after  a  brief  pause  and  a  gorgeous  display, 
rushed  into  each  other's  arms,  amid  the  acclamations 
of  the  throngs,  who  knew  and  cared  nothing  for  Ami's 
agony.  Three  times  did  the  kings  embrace.  Arm-in- 
arm they  had  walked  toward  the  pavilion. 

Vian  could  hardly  understand  how  he  had  escaped 
noticing  what  on  all  sides  was  held  to  be  a  scene  un- 
surpassed. But  he  remembered  that  there  had  been  a 
mighty  rush  of  interior  currents  as  the  three — Ami, 
Astre"e,  and  himself —  stood  alone  on  that  chosen  spot, 
meaning  to  behold  a  spectacle,  and  instead  finding  one 
of  life's  most  significant  milestones. 

"  Only  my  Lord  Cardinal  and  Admiral  Bonnivet  en- 
tered the  pavilion  with  their  masters,"  said  one  of  the 
constables  to  Vian,  who  with  drawn  sword  in  company 
with  another  was  keeping  ward  at  the  salute. 

"  Bons  amis  /  "  "  French  and  English  !  "  shouted  the 
officers  of  both  armies,  who  now  had  broken  ranks,  and 
lost  in  each  other's  dominions,  with  pipes  and  clarions 
and  waving  pennons  were  attempting  to  create  again 
to  sight  and  hearing  a  mighty  expression  of  that  some- 
what recently  born  affection  which  France  and  Eng- 
land now  enjoyed.  Two  persons,  who  had  been  waiting 
through  laborious  weeks  for  this  hour,  in  order  that  they 
might  then  fitly  utter  the  deeper  feelings  of  friendship 
along  with  the  more  superficial  emotions  connected  with 
these  pageants,  did  not  care  even  to  see  each  other 
VOL.  i.  —  23 


354  MONK  AND  KNIGHT. 

now.  These  were  the  knight  and  the  monk,  —  Ami  and 
Vian. 

On  Monday,  the  i  ith,  Vian  and  Ami,  without  an  utter- 
ance one  to  the  other,  saw  the  tournament  which  on 
Friday  and  Saturday  the  former  had  prepared,  enter  upon 
its  glorious  career.  There  "had  been  some  difficulty  as 
to  which  shield  should  hang  above  the  other;  but  it 
was  settled,  not  by  the  French  Constable  and  Dorset, 
who  were  chosen,  but  by  bluff  Harry  himself,  that  they 
should  be  hung  equally  high,  —  the  French  King's  on  the 
right  and  his  own  on  the  left.  When  Ami  presented  the 
pennon  of  Francis  as  a  raspberry,  Vian  suspended  upon 
the  hawthorn-tree,  which  was  chosen  as  Henry's,  the 
tree  of  nobility,  the  shield  of  the  King  of  England.  Once 
their  eyes  met ;  and  Ami's  eyes  were  directed,  by  a  pow- 
erful glance  from  the  monk,  to  the  palace  of  Henry  VIII., 
in  front  of  which  Ami  read  the  words :  "  He  whom  I 
favor,  wins." 

Francis  I.  had  dined  on  Sunday  with  the  English 
Queen  at  Guisnes,  as  had  Henry  VIII.  with  Queen 
Claude  at  Ardres.  In  the  course  of  the  conversation  each 
monarch,  seeking  to  avoid  unpleasant  themes,  such  as 
Charles  V.  and  the  Reformers,  had  found  himself  chat- 
ting about  so  inconsiderable  a  person  as  the  monk  Vian, 
and  his  valor  of  the  day  preceding  in  saving  Astree. 
Astree's  life,  it  was  understood  at  both  courts,  Vian  had 
preserved. 

"  And  he  is  a  scholar  of  wondrous  gifts,"  said  Kath- 
erine  of  Arragon. 

"  I  trust  he  does  not  consort  with  such  scholars  as  those 
who  infest  France  at  this  hour,"  remarked  the  king,  who 
never  failed  to  remember  that  Henry's  queen  was  the 
aunt  of  Charles  V.,  and  therefore  could  have  no  love  for 
what  might  lead  to  heresy. 

"  He  has  been  befriended  by  Erasmus  himself;  and 
the  wonder  grows  when  we  behold  his  learned  pages  on 


LOVE  AND  LEARNING.  355 

matters  ecclesiastical.  I  doubt  not  he  would  have  been 
Abbot  of  Glastonbury  had  he  not  come  to  serve  our  Lord 
Cardinal  Wolsey,"  pursued  the  queen. 

"  Is  it  he  ?  I  think  now  it  is  he  of  whom  Erasmus 
himself  has  written  to  us."  And  Francis  I.  remembered 
then  that  a  prudent  silence  might  be  most  valuable,  for 
he  had  already  considered  the  plan  of  securing  young 
scholars  which  Erasmus  himself  had  suggested ;  and  this 
involved  a  hint  of  Vian's  becoming -at  some  time  profes- 
sor in  the  College  Royal. 

Three  years  before,  Bude"  had  offered  Erasmus  a  place, 
in  the  name  of  the  king ;  and  the  elder  scholar  had  bade 
Bude  look  out  for  Vian.  This  the  Sorbonne  and,  above 
all,  Duprat  could  not  for  a  moment  approve. 

Later  on  in  that  Sunday  afternoon,  at  Guisnes,  Vian 
had  been  received  by  the  Sovereign  of  France ;  the 
French  monarch  found,  before  an  hour  had  elapsed,  that 
his  prejudices  against  Englishmen  had  passed  away  in  the 
presence  of  the  Benedictine. 

"  I  could  love  every  Englishman,  if  they  were  all  so 
refined  as  he,"  said  the  French  King. 

With  delicate  reserve  did  the  monk  speak  of  the  king's 
friend,  Ami,  —  his  acquirements,  his  brilliant  abilities,  his 
knightly  bearing,  his  theories  of  life,  his  loyalty  to  his 
sovereign.  In  vain  did  even  Francis  I.  seek  to  extort 
from  Vian  a  syllable  which  reflected  upon  Ami's  temper 
or  his  love. 

"  His  devotion  to  the  beautiful  lady  is  more  ardent 
than  the  love  of  kings,"  remarked  Wolsey's  lieutenant. 

Francis  I.  smiled  at  this  somewhat  audacious  sally,  and 
resumed  the  conversation,  which  included  such  topics  as 
the  English  monasteries,  Thomas  More,  Erasmus,  and 
"  the  new  learning."  The  evening  at  length  came,  and 
the  King  of  France  took  his  leave  of  the  Queen  of  Eng- 
land. "He  did  not  leave,  however,  until  he  had  promised 
himself  the  pleasure  of  seeing  Vian  again. 


356  MONK  AND  KNIGHT. 

"  A  most  engaging  monk  is  Vian,"  he  said  to  Queen 
Katherine. 

Over  at  Ardres,  Henry  VIII.  had  been  seated  for  long 
hours  with  the  Queen  Claude,  and  the  most  admiring  of 
Ami's  friends  at  court,  —  the  Duchesse  d'Alencon. 
Henry  had  often  heard  of  her  accomplishments,  and  that 
Francis  I.  called  her  "  Marguerite  of  Marguerites ;  "  and 
soon  after  his  arrival,  he  wondered  not  that  Marot  en- 
joyed reading  poems  to  her,  or  that  the  king  loved  his 
sister  as  tenderly  as  his  phrase  implied. 

"  Your  royal  brother  has  a  most  chivalrous  and  learned 
friend  in  the  knight  Ami,"  said  Henry,  who  had  heard 
of  Ami  through  both  Vian  and  Wolsey,  when  they  had 
talked  over  the  preparations. 

"  And  the  knight  tells  us,"  replied  the  duchesse,  "  that 
your  court  is  adorned  by  at  least  one  of  the  most  able  of 
young  monks, — the  Benedictine  friar,  Vian." 

It  never  had  struck  the  King  before  how  little  of  the 
friar  was  in  Vian. 

Everything  at  the  court  of  Queen  Claude  that  day  was 
magnificent.  Why  should  not  Henry  himself  talk  now  in 
a  stream  of  exaggerated  luxuriance  ?  His  court  must  at 
least  equal  that  of  his  cousin  in  scholarship ;  for  he  knew 
himself  to  be  more  learned  than  the  Sovereign  of  France. 
He  had  beheld  on  that  afternoon  the  queen  clad  in  gold 
frieze,  Mme.  de  Vendome  clothed  in  satin  and  gems,  the 
incomparable  Duchesse  d'Alencon  arrayed  in  velvet  and 
rubies.  He  himself  sat  easily,  with  his  wide  collar  heavy 
with  the  art  of  the  lapidary  and  goldsmith.  He  had 
leisurely  admired  the  exhibit  of  female  loveliness  which 
flitted  through  the  extemporized  house.  Why  should  he 
not  speak  in  magnificent  eulogy  of  the  brightest  young 
monk  in  England? 

"  The  most  learned  among  the  most  loving,  the  most 
loving  among  the  most  learned,"  said  Henry,  drawing  a 
long  breath  into  his  burly  body.  "  He  is  already  the 


LOVE  AND  LEARNING.  357 

companion  of  Erasmus  and  the  friend  of  Thomas  More. 
He  has  the  greatest  variety  of  powers.  Glastonbury 
Abbey  had  no  peer  for  him.  Hampton  Court  and  White- 
hall have  never  seen  his  equal  in  expedients  of  policy 
or  knowledge.  He  was  solitary  among  monks  whose 
whole  life  was  given  to  books.  He  knows  manuscripts ; 
and  he  writes  odes  which  are  more  beautiful  than  those  of 
the  ancients." 

"Is  he  a  poet  such  as  Master  Clement  Marot?"  in- 
quired the  pretty  Marguerite,  who,  as  Duchesse  d'Alen- 
con,  had  not  forgotten  the  love-songs  which  Marot  had 
taught  her. 

"  A  poet  in  truth  !  Would  that  you  might  hear  his 
melodious  voice  in  his  own  lines  !  A  musician  as  well  is 
this  Vian.  'T  is  he  who  made  the  choir  at  Glastonbury 
one  sacred  harmony  with  his  own  singing.  He  has  mas- 
tered musical  instruments.  He  brought  us  the  harp 
at  Greenwich,  the  lute,  and  the  cithern ;  and  sweet, 
indeed,  are  the  songs  which  he  sings  while  he  plays  upon 
these." 

The  musical  soul  of  Marguerite  was  all  attention  ;  and 
she  promised  herself,  on  the  instant,  that  she  would  break 
down  Ami's  influence  with  Francis  the  king,  and  that  in 
spite  of  the  jealous  hate  which  the  knight  bore  to  the 
monk,  and  which  he  had  confessed  to  the  duchesse, 
Vian  of  Glastonbury  should  recite  his  verses  and  sing  his 
songs  at  Ardres. 

As  Henry  VIII.  rode  away  at  five  o'clock,  displaying 
his  skill  as  a  horseman  in  curvetings  and  other  exhibitions 
of  grace  and  mastery,  Ami  Perrin,  who  had  overheard  all 
this  praise  of  Vian,  was  burning  with  jealous  hate,  and 
resolving  that  if  his  love  or  power  could  prevent  it,  the 
monk  should  never  come  to  Ardres. 

"  Astree,  you  said  once,  « I  fear  a  monk,'  "  said  Ami 
inquiringly,  when  he  found  her  alone. 

"And  I  should  not  be  alive  to  tell  you  again,  if  it 


MONK  AND  KNIGHT. 

had  not  been  for  a  monk,"  answered  she,  as  she  sought 
in  vain  to  kiss  the  lips  which  then  burned  with  curses. 

There  is  no  such  apparently  evil  world  as  is  this,  to  an 
unreasonably  jealous  heart.  The  assertion  of  all  others 
that  it  might  be  foolish  made  Ami  more  earnest  that  he 
should  make  his  hate  more  reasonable  to  himself.  Every 
one  who  knew  the  monk  Vian  knew  how  foolish  was 
Ami's  jealousy. 

•"He  is  a  Pythagorean,"  said  the  Duchesse  d'Alen- 
con,  who,  as  Marguerite  de  Valois,  with  Nouvisset  had 
dabbled  a  little  in  Greek  philosophy,  "  and  it  is  impossi- 
ble that  he  really  loves  any  woman.  Women  to  Pythag- 
oreans are  only  evil  men,  who  have  been  born  again  on 
a  lower  plane.  Besides,  he  is  a  monk.  He  is  under  a 
vow." 

"  That  fact  would  not  make  me  less  certain  of  his  in- 
fernal plot  to  hold  Astree  in  his  arms,"  said  Ami,  as  sav- 
agely as  he  dare  say  anything  to  the  king's  sister.  And 
then,  ;as  .he  thought  of  it,  —  the  apparent  longing  with 
which  Vian  at  first  looked  into  her  eyes,  the  swift  and 
measured  praise  which  came  from  his  lips  at  the  moment 
when  he  met  her,  the  crafty  words  which  Vian  spoke 
about  the  king's  eyes  which  put  them  into  agreement, 
above  all,  the  seizing  and  tearing  her  out  of  his  own 
arms,  —  he  could  feel  his  grasp  loosening  yet,  as  again 
he  could  also  see  the  rushing  horse,  —  oh,  it  was  all  too 
much  ! 

"The  detestable  monk  really  loves  her,  and  I  will  have 
revenge  upon  him,"  said  Ami,  as  he  strode  away. 

Everything  fanned  the  flame.  Not  an  hour  passed  that 
some  one  did  not  congratulate  the  lover  that  Astre"e  had 
been  saved  from  death. 

"And  who  and  what  is  the  monk  Vian?"  inquired 
these  bearers  of  congratulatory  tidings,  with  unconscious 
pertinacity. 

Every   one  praised  the  courageous  alertness   of  the 


LOVE  AND  LEARNING.  359 

monk ;  and  some  even  criticised  Ami  by  asking,  "  Where 
was  the  knight  at  the  time?  " 

"This  implied  censure  I  will  not  endure,"  said  he  to 
Astree.  "  I  was  trying  to  save  you." 

Tears  came  into  Ami's  eyes,  but  they  were  soon  gone 
into  the  flame  on  his  cheek.  In  all  this  difficulty  with 
Vian  and  his  own  soul,  Ami  had  not  the  smallest  thought 
of  objecting  to  anything  which  Astre"e — his  "star,"  as 
he  kept  calling  her  through  these  .hours  of  gloom  —  had 
felt  or  said  or  done.  True,  after  consciousness  had  come, 
she  did  inquire  gratefully  about  Vian,  and  even  asked  if 
he  was  harmed ;  but  Ami  was  not  made  so  ignoble  by 
his  jealousy  as  to  censure  her. 

She  had  made  him  forget  everything  but  her  loveliness 
and  nobility,  when  she  said  :  "  I  know  you  did  all  that  a 
lover  and  a  knight  could  do.  Vian  the  monk  happened 
to  be  on  the  spot  where  was  safety ;  but  he  did  not  know 
it  until  afterward.  Your  place  was  the  place  of  danger ; 
no  one  of  us  knew  it  until  afterward.  If  you  had  been 
in  the  place  of  the  monk,  you  would  have  saved  me." 

It  seemed  so  infinitely  true  to  Astree's  soul.  He 
never  discovered  that  the  fires  of  his  passion  lit  up  the 
trifling  possibility  of  the  contrary  supposition  being  true 
into  a  very  Sinai  of  truth  itself.  The  light,  however,  per- 
mitted the  casting  of  some  awful  shadows. 


358  MONK  AND  KNIGHT. 

had  not  been  for  a  monk,"  answered  she,  as  she  sought 
in  vain  to  kiss  the  lips  which  then  burned  with  curses. 

There  is  no  such  apparently  evil  world  as  is  this,  to  an 
unreasonably  jealous  heart.  The  assertion  of  all  others 
that  it  might  be  foolish  made  Ami  more  earnest  that  he 
should  make  his  hate  more  reasonable  to  himself.  Every 
one  who  knew  the  monk  Vian  knew  how  foolish  was 
Ami's  jealousy. 

•"He  is  a  Pythagorean,"  said  the  Duchesse  d'Alen- 
con,  who,  as  Marguerite  de  Valois,  with  Nouvisset  had 
dabbled  a  little  in  Greek  philosophy,  "  and  it  is  impossi- 
ble that  he  really  loves  any  woman.  Women  to  Pythag- 
oreans are  only  evil  men,  who  have  been  born  again  on 
a  lower  plane.  Besides,  he  is  a  monk.  He  is  under  a 
vow." 

"  That  fact  would  not  make  me  less  certain  of  his  in- 
fernal plot  to  hold  Astree  in  his  arms,"  said  Ami,  as  sav- 
agely as  he  dare  say  anything  to  the  king's  sister.  And 
.then,  :as  .he  thought  of  it,  —  the  apparent  longing  with 
which  Vian  at  first  looked  into  her  eyes,  the  swift  and 
measured  praise  which  came  from  his  lips  at  the  moment 
when  he  met  her,  the  crafty  words  which  Vian  spoke 
about  the  king's  eyes  which  put  them  into  agreement, 
above  all,  the  seizing  and  tearing  her  out  of  his  own 
arms,  —  he  could  feel  his  grasp  loosening  yet,  as  again 
he  could  also  see  the  rushing  horse,  —  oh,  it  was  all  too 
much  ! 

"The  detestable  monk  really  loves  her,  and  I  will  have 
revenge  upon  him,"  said  Ami,  as  he  strode  away. 

Everything  fanned  the  flame.  Not  an  hour  passed  that 
some  one  did  not  congratulate  the  lover  that  Astree  had 
been  saved  from  death. 

"And  who  and  what  is  the  monk  Vian?"  inquired 
these  bearers  of  congratulatory  tidings,  with  unconscious 
pertinacity. 

Every   one  praised  the  courageous  alertness   of  the 


LOVE  AND  LEARNING.  359 

monk ;  and  some  even  criticised  Ami  by  asking,  "  Where 
was  the  knight  at  the  time?" 

"This  implied  censure  I  will  not  endure,"  said  he  to 
Astree.  "  I  was  trying  to  save  you." 

Tears  came  into  Ami's  eyes,  but  they  were  soon  gone 
into  the  flame  on  his  cheek.  In  all  this  difficulty  with 
Vian  and  his  own  soul,  Ami  had  not  the  smallest  thought 
of  objecting  to  anything  which  Astree — his  "star,"  as 
he  kept  calling  her  through  these  t  hours  of  gloom  —  had 
felt  or  said  or  done.  True,  after  consciousness  had  come, 
she  did  inquire  gratefully  about  Vian,  and  even  asked  if 
he  was  harmed ;  but  Ami  was  not  made  so  ignoble  by 
his  jealousy  as  to  censure  her. 

She  had  made  him  forget  everything  but  her  loveliness 
and  nobility,  when  she  said  :  "  I  know  you  did  all  that  a 
lover  and  a  knight  could  do.  Vian  the  monk  happened 
to  be  on  the  spot  where  was  safety ;  but  he  did  not  know 
it  until  afterward.  Your  place  was  the  place  of  danger ; 
no  one  of  us  knew  it  until  afterward.  If  you  had  been 
in  the  place  of  the  monk,  you  would  have  saved  me." 

It  seemed  so  infinitely  true  to  Astree's  soul.  He 
never  discovered  that  the  fires  of  his  passion  lit  up  the 
trifling  possibility  of  the  contrary  supposition  being  true 
into  a  very  Sinai  of  truth  itself.  The  light,  however,  per- 
mitted the  casting  of  some  awful  shadows. 


CHAPTER   XXXIV. 

AN    UNHORSED    KNIGHT. 

Oh,  wad  ye  tak  a  thought  and  mend ! 

BURNS. 

T^VERYTHING  appeared  to  go  against  Ami  for  the 
Ij  next  forty-eight  hours.  Even  the  grounds  chosen 
for  the  lists,  which  were  three  hundred  yards  long  and 
more  than  one  hundred  yards  in  width,  seemed  a  poor 
selection.  The  tapestry  hangings  for  the  enclosing  gal- 
leries were  unaccountably  dull. 

"  Those  chambers,  —  they  were  carefully  glazed  for  the 
queens,  —  how  ill-placed  they  are  !  "  said  he  to  Astree. 
"  The  foss  is  too  shallow  to  keep  the  crowd  back." 

Alas,  Ami,  nothing  goes  well  to  a  sick  heart ! 

"  Blunderers,  all  of  them  !  "  And  he  pointed  toward 
the  twelve  English  and  twelve  French  archers  guarding 
the  entrances.  He  was  convinced  that  even  the  cloth  of 
gold  which  served  for  the  trunk  and  old  leaves,  and 
the  green  silk  which  had  been  made  into  the  living  foli- 
age, and  even  the  silver  and  Venetian  gold  which  fancy 
was  expected  to  transform  into  flowers  and  fruits  upon 
the  tree  of  Francis  I.,  under  whose  immense  branches  the 
heralds  stood  on  a  huge  damask  mound,  constituted  only 
a  vulgar  and  uncomely  pretence.  Indeed,  everything 
save  Astree  was  a  lie  to  Ami. 


AN  UNHORSED  KNIGHT.  361 

Men  are  driven  to  truth  oftentimes  by  experience  with 
being  untrue  to  themselves. 

"The  king  appears  in  bad  condition,"  complained  he. 

It  was  true.  The  monarchs,  each  supported  by  eigh- 
teen aids,  had  held  the  lists  against  all  comers ;  but  the 
swords  which  Henry  easily  wielded  were  too  heavy  for 
the  arms  of  Francis.  Ami  was  in  a  rage  when  his  own 
sovereign  essayed  in  vain  to  sweep  a  huge  blade  about 
his  royal  head. 

"  Astree,"  said  he,  "  my  king  has  been  a  baby,  with  his 
mother  and  Duprat  as  his  guardians.  Look  you  !  I  love 
him.  They  are  spurring  their  chargers  now.  On  my  soul, 
how  well  he  rides  !  Bayard  himself  made  him  a  knight. 
Ah  !  the  lance  of  Henry  couches  low.  See,  Astre"e  ! 
The  shock  from  Henry  will  be  too  great ;  powerful  was 
that  thrust !  Oh,  I  shall  not  permit  my  sovereign's  saddle 
to  be  emptied  like  that,  —  not  I,  Astre"e  —  " 

Ami  leaped  from  her.  Soon  the  knight  held  a  lance. 
Before  many  minutes  had  gone,  Ami  had  triumphed. 
First,  and  indeed  solitary  among  the  French,  did  he  un- 
horse the  splendid  Duke  of  Suffolk,  Charles  Brandon,  who 
had  divided  honors  with  Henry  VIII.  at  the  tournament. 

Astree  was  aglow  with  proud  excitement.  Every  lady 
in  jewels,  every  emblazoned  man,  did  her  honor.  Ami's 
chivalry  was  the  one  theme.  But,  alas  !  the  mind  of  a 
jealous  man  is  not  to  be  bewildered  even  by  his  successes. 
With  fatal  agony  it  is  predetermined  to  one  object  of 
contemplation. 

"  I  wish,"  said  the  knight,  "it  had  been  the  despicable 
monk.  I  had  even  run  him  through,  as  he  lay  there  in 
the  dust." 

Astrde  could  not  restrain  herself.  For  Ami's  sake 
she  would  speak.  "  Is  that  of  the  new  knighthood  ? 
Ami,  he  who  keeps  my  love  must  be  a  true  knight." 

Francis  I.,  beloved  of  Ami,  friend  and  king,  came  close 
to  him  who  at  that  moment  was  the  pride  of  France. 


362  MONK  AND  KNIGHT. 

"Would  that  Chevalier  Bayard  had  seen  it!"  The 
king's  eyes  were  congratulations.  "  Ah !  would  that 
Nouvisset,  Francesco,  and  Admiral  Andrea  Doria  were 
here  !  But  Astree  "  —  and  the  languishing  eyes  of  the 
monarch  became  intense  with  interest  —  "  Astree  is  here. 
I  would  have  you  dine  with  my  sister,  Duchesse  d'Alen- 
con,  and  my  queen.  Astree,  you  will  come  with  your 
knight !  Farewell !  " 

"  Sire,"  asked  Ami,  "will  any  from  the  camp  of  Henry 
of  England  be  with  us?  " 

"  Ami,  beloved  and  faithful,"  replied  his  Majesty,  with 
hesitation,  "  only  at  our  desire  or  at  our  command. 
Farewell ! " 

What  could  this  mean?  "  Desire  "  and  "  Command," 
—  two  realms  overruled  by  two  sceptres.  Under  which 
was  Vian?  Was  he  under  either?  Would  Vian  grace 
or  disgrace  that  occasion  ?  Would  he  be  present  ?  All 
these  questions  occupied  Ami's  mind,  to  the  exclusion 
even  of  Astree's  grateful  enjoyment  at  such  an  hour. 

Ami  had  the  right  to  make  such  queries  his  own. 
Louise  of  Savoy,  as  we  know,  was  sure  that  Vian  —  a 
Benedictine  monk  —  would  more  strongly  attach  Ami  to 
the  Holy  Church. 

Besides  this,  the  King  of  France  now  believed  that  in 
meeting  Vian  he  had  met  the  most  fascinating  man  in 
England.  His  complete  self-mastery,  his  far-sighted  con- 
ceptions of  human  progress,  his  admirable  temper,  his 
various  accomplishments,  his  exquisite  taste  —  all  of 
them  rinding  easy  expression  upon  his  lips  or  in  graceful 
action  —  had  charmed  and  captivated  the  French  King. 

"Is  it  he?  It  is  he,"  said  the  king  to  Louise  of 
Savoy.  "  It  is  Vian,  of  whom  Erasmus  told  us." 

"  He  surpasses  Marot  in  rhymes,  and  the  lute-players 
of  Florence  in  music,"  said  the  graceful  Marguerite. 

"  And  a  monk,  —  a  Benedictine  ?  "  carefully  asked  the 
shrewd  Louise  of  Savoy. 


AN  UNHORSED  KNIGHT.  363 

"  Yes ;  without  a  peril  in  his  soul  for  a  woman  or  a 
man.  Indeed,  he  is  a  Pythagorean,"  said  the  enthusias- 
tic Duchesse  d'Alencon. 

Louise  of  Savoy  knew  nothing  of  Pythagoras  ;  but  she 
had  abounding  confidence  in  Marguerite  and  in  her  use 
of  this  new  name.  Somehow  she  obtained  the  impression 
that  no  court- rumor  of  an  unpleasant  nature  would  be 
possible  on  Vian's  account,  because  he  was  a  Pythago- 
rean ;  that  was  sufficient. 

"  Vian  is  a  scholar,"  said  Francis  I.  "  My  court  must 
concern  itself  with  ideas,  as  Ami  has  urged.  Vian  —  if 
only  my  cousin  Henry  will  yield  him  to  France  —  may 
supplant  the  heretics  who  endanger  everything  by  their 
advance,  and  the  worn-out  reactionaries  who  imperil 
everything  by  their  retreat.  The  true  scholar  must  be 
a  soldier  of  another  sort  than  these." 

The  king  had  a  dim  vision  of  what  France  needed. 
He  entertained  the  notion  that  Vian  might  do  for  France 
what  he  thought  More,  Linacre,  Grocyn,  and  perhaps 
Colet  were  doing  for  England.  The  lines  of  power  were 
about  to  pass  out  of  Ami's  hands. 

An  hour  had  passed,  and  the  Duchesse  d'Alencon 
had  rehearsed  it  all  —  the  plans,  the  hopes,  the  accom- 
plished facts  —  to  Astree.  Never  did  Ami  feel  so  surely 
that  Astree,  his  love,  did  not  desire  to  see  the  young 
monk  again,  as  when  she  brought  the  whole  story  to 
him. 

It  had  been  a  busy  morning  with  both  Ami  and  Vian. 
Nothing,  however,  had  made  it  easy  or  possible  for  either 
to  utter  a  word  to  the  other.  Francis  I.  had  long  ago, 
in  the  progress  of  these  ceremonies,  broken  down  all 
suspicion,  and  made  the  intimacy  of  the  two  monarchs 
appear  to  be  a  stable  fact  for  future  policies,  by  going 
with  only  four  companions  to  the  very  apartments  of 
Henry  VIII.,  and  having  entered  the  chamber  of  the 
English  King  alone,  by  saying  in  great  glee,  "  Here,  you 


364  MONK  AND  KNIGHT. 

see,  I  am  your  prisoner."  A  hearty  friendship  had 
sprung  up  between  the  two  camps.  And  now  the  unre- 
strained hospitalities  of  this  unique  occasion  were  to  be 
fitly  concluded.  The  monk  Vian  had  charge  of  the 
chapel ;  the  knight  Ami  promised  Bonnivet  to  arrange 
the  banquet. 

"  But,"  said  Ami,  "  on  one  condition." 

"  On  any  condition,  faithful  knight !  "  replied  the 
admiral. 

"  I  shall  not  dine  with  Wolsey's  monkish  servant,  — 
that  brazen  and  hateful  Vian." 

"  The  banquet  you  may  prepare.  I  will  beg  the  King 
of  France  that  any  dinner  which  would  bring  Vian 
hither  be  dismissed  from  his  thoughts." 

Vian  had  made  the  chapel  for  the  morning  of  the 
24th  a  shining  witness  to  his  own  industry  and  intelli- 
gence, and  a  fascinating  testimonial  to  the  richness  of 
the  now  concluding  pageant.  Cardinal  Wolsey,  attired 
in  proper  robes,  sang  solemn  Mass.  His  voice  had  the 
ring  of  conscious  triumph,  as  its  echoes  passed  above 
the  altar  and  the  reliquaries,  and  died  away  against  the 
two  canopies  of  cloth  of  gold  hanging  at  the  side.  Leg- 
ates of  England  vied  with  bishops  and  cardinals  of 
France  to  make  the  scene  illustrious  in  ecclesiastical 
personages.  Courtesies,  so  like  flowers  on  thornless  but 
dead  stalks,  appeared  at  every  juncture.  Even  the  Gos- 
pels the  French  King  refused  to  kiss,  as  the  book  was 
borne  in  the  hands  of  Constable  de  Bourbon,  until  it 
had  first  been  offered  to  the  King  of  England.  The 
queens  enacted  the  same  courtesy,  when  at  the  "  Agnus 
Dei  "  the  "  Pax  "  was  presented.  These  excellent  ladies 
kissed  each  other,  to  settle  the  controversy. 

Pace  preached  in  Latin  on  the  blessings  of  peace,  and 
then  sprang  into  the  sky  a  monstrous  achievement  of 
pyrotechnics.  Throngs  beheld  with  awe  a  huge  salaman- 


AN  UNHORSED  KNIGHT.  365 

der,  spouting  fire  and  traversing  the  sky  toward  Guisnes. 
It  occupied  the  mind  of  the  crowd  at  the  celebration  of 
Mass,  which  occurred  immediately  after  its  appearance. 
It  was  the  last  flash  of  a  huge  dream. 

The  banquet  came.  Kings  and  legates  forgot  to  be 
temperate ;  knights  and  monks  forgot  to  quarrel.  The 
great  fountains  of  wine  gushed  once  more,  sending  their 
red  streams  up  into  the  golden  daytime ;  and  then  the 
splendid  picture  faded.  The  red.  cheek  of  Ami  and  the 
determined  eye  of  Vian,  each  reflecting  the  suggestion 
contained  in  the  other,  remained  the  unsuspected  and 
doubtless  unseen  testimonials  that  something  had  oc- 
curred on  the  "  Field  of  the  Cloth  of  Gold  "  which  would 
influence  human  history. 


END   OF   VOL.    I. 


